


my very soul demands you

by afteriwake



Category: Historical RPF, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Big Brother Mycroft, Case Fic, Characters Stop Ageing, Established Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade, Eventual Sherlock Holmes/Molly Hooper, F/M, Historical References, Immortality, Married Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade, Minor Mary Morstan/John Watson, Molly Hooper/Mary Morstan Friendship, Non Canonical Immortal, POV Sherlock Holmes, Past Sherlock Holmes/Charlotte Brontë, Sherlock Being Sherlock, Sherlock Holmes & John Watson Friendship, Sherlock Holmes Has a Heart, Sherlock Holmes and Feelings, Sherlock Holmes/Molly Hooper Kissing, Sherlock Is Over Two Hundred Years Old, Sherlock is a Brat, Sherlock-centric, Soul Bond, Young Molly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-20
Updated: 2015-12-20
Packaged: 2018-05-06 04:35:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 17
Words: 22,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5403209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock Holmes has spent over two hundred years on this earth, living a life where he didn't know (and frankly didn't care) whether he'll met his soul mate or not. Once he stopped aging at the age of eighteen he worked tirelessly on his goal of becoming the best consulting detective in the world. Over the centuries, though, he developed a reputation...and fans. Fans which have plagued him over the years. And on the day that one fan in particular leaves his gruesome calling card yet again, the unthinkable happens: he meets his soul mate in the basement of St. Barts, a supposedly meek and unassuming woman named Molly Hooper. Knowing that this is the start of the end of his functional immortality, Sherlock races to stop a killer while convincing his soul mate he isn't the biggest arsehole in the whole of London.</p><p>Hopefully it will all work out in the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [renniejoy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/renniejoy/gifts), [dearly](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dearly/gifts).



> So this is my second Sherlolly Big Bang fic! It’s a hybrid soul mate/historical fiction AU. The soul mate AU was inspired by a Tumblr post by user **reliquiaen** who suggested an “ _AU where people age until they reach 18 and then stop aging until they meet their soul mate so they can grow old together_ ,” and I was struck by the idea of an AU where Sherlock and Mycroft had been alive in the Victorian era and Molly was much younger. Somehow in the course of my studies I got inspired to include a friendship with Charlotte Brontë that became a dalliance and then one thing led to another and I ended up with this story. I’m really quite proud of how it turned out. Many thanks to my lovely beta reader **renniejoy** for being the absolute best ever and my wonderful cheerleader **consultingpathologist** for all the encouragement.
> 
> Also, many many thanks to my wonderful artist **[julescheret](http://julescheret.tumblr.com/)** on Tumblr who did this gorgeous piece of artwork for this fic. I think it's absolutely stunning and I hope you'll let her know how much you love it on her Tumblr (click on the thumbnail to go to the post for the full size image):
> 
>  
> 
> [](http://julescheret.tumblr.com/post/135535698029)  
> 

**April 3rd, 1855**

He had not wanted to come.

He had not wanted to be anywhere in the vicinity of this area, not with the reminders. Not with her burial being so close. He wanted to stay in London, stay in his home and drink port all day, lose himself in his grief. Or perhaps take himself to the local gambling hells, take the local rakes for all their money, see if he could entice a few into some rounds of fisticuffs and wipe the floor with them. Pounding his fists into the faces of a few high and mighty lords might make him feel better, because this…this was not.

He surveyed the body one more time. A young woman, dressed in the typical mourning gown of their time: high necked black frock, corseting in the back, voluminous black silk. The stitching was dodgy, which meant it was sewn to fit on the victim rather than the victim’s own personal wear. A rather morbid touch. Her hair was quite elegantly styled, her cheeks rouged up so that even in the pallor of death she appeared young and vibrant.

And yet it did not interest him.

He simply wanted to mourn his loss. His loss twiceover, he thought, the more permanent loss this time. The cruel loss of death, taking away both her and her unborn babe. Not his babe, though. No, not his. Cause of death: phthisis, though he had heard whispers that a household servant had had typhus and, moreover, his— 

No, she was not his. Had not been his for many months. Well over a year now, actually.

Had never been his, really.

That was the way soul mates worked.

He shut his eyes and ran a hand through his hair. He did not care about his appearance right now, and had not taken the time to slick his hair back, as was custom. His brother would be scandalized if he saw him but he didn’t give two figs about that. He wanted to go home, back to London, baker to his flat on Baker Street, to mourn in peace. He did not care about this murder, tantalizing as it was. He ran his finger across the three dots raised on the woman’s wrist before he carefully lowered it again. “Watson,” he said brusquely.

“Yes?” his friend, his companion, his confidant John Watson said. He, too, had the body of a youth, though he was already well into his eighties by then. “What is it, Holmes?”

“I wish to depart. Have the carriage brought around,” he said, standing.

Watson gave his friend a dubious look, and then nodded. “All right. But…nothing to give to the Inspector?”

“Let them solve this on their own,” he said, turning and walking away from the scene. The sooner he got away from Haworth, the better. He needed to be far away from here. Far, far away. He knew that he was regarded as the great Sherlock Holmes, the consulting detective who could solve any crime imaginable, but tonight…

Tonight he just wanted to be Sherlock, the man who was grieving for a woman he once loved whom he would never see again, and he wanted to do so in peace and in quiet, as far away from the Church of St Michael and All Angels as possible.


	2. Chapter 2

**March 31st, 2008**

It was on days like today that he felt the weight of the over two hundred years he’d been alive on his shoulders. He stood by the window, his newspaper abandoned by the chair. 221B Baker Street had been his home since the mid-1830s, and aside from updates in the interior comforts, such as indoor plumbing and a dishwasher and central heating, it had looked much the same ever since. The furniture was still the nice, solid Victorian-era stuff that his original housekeeper had favored. He’d managed to keep the same patterned wallpaper in every room it was used in since he’d had it redone in 1888 and similar paint colors since 1903.

His flat mate hadn’t complained in the over hundred and fifty years he’d been living there. Sherlock knew he was a hard man to live with but John had managed to beautifully. He didn’t know what he’d do without John, to be honest. He rather hoped that either neither of them found their soul mates or that they both found them at the same time. He was already looking at losing his brother in a few years time, since his brother had discovered his soul mate nearly thirty years prior. He didn’t want to lose John as well.

He shook the melancholy thought out of his head. His eyes drifted towards the newspaper, the headline at the top of the front page. **Victorian Era Serial Killer Strikes Again?** it read, taunting him. There was no need for the question mark at the end. He knew the killer was, indeed, his old enemy. He’d been chasing the shadowy killer for over a hundred and fifty years and knew the killer’s modus operandi oh so well. He needed to make sure he was brought in on this case, and considering he had more clout than any senior detective currently at Scotland Yard that shouldn’t be hard.

He went for his mobile phone. Of all the inventions he had seen since his birth, this was one of the ones he loved and loathed most in equal measure. He loved the smartphone he had now, the ability to access information at any time, anywhere. But he disliked the fact that anyone could get a hold of him whenever they damn well chose, _especially_ his brother. It had been much better when his brother had needed to actually send a letter through his valet, or a horse and carriage to fetch him, because it had been easier to avoid them. With this blasted mobile his brother could track his every move through GPS. But at the moment he needed it to call his brother’s husband, Greg Holmes-Lestrade, the one detective in Scotland Yard who seemed to actually like him. Which, considering they were family, should obviously be the case.

He dialed Greg’s personal number as opposed to the number for the fortress where he lived, hoping that he was at the crime scene. Greg answered after three rings. “It was your good friend who paid us a visit last night, wasn’t it?” he asked.

“Unfortunately,” Sherlock said. “The press is going to have a field day if I’m not involved in this.”

“I know that, and so do my superiors,” Greg said. “Which is why your brother is put out because I missed out on drinks with diplomats last night to be at this crime scene.”

Sherlock frowned. “Why wasn’t I brought in on this last night?” he asked.

“Interference,” Greg replied. “Haverford doesn’t like you.”

“Haverford hasn’t liked me since 1954,” Sherlock grumbled. 

“Sherlock, ninety-five percent of Scotland Yard rues your name,” Greg said in an amused tone. “You know that. You’ve had, what, nearly two hundred years to build up your reputation as the most disagreeable consultant to ever grace the Yard?”

“But I’ve also had nearly two hundred years to be the most effective one they’ve ever had,” he pointed out.

“Which is why they keep you around.”

Sherlock shook his head. “Am I going to be allowed at the scene or not?” he asked with an exasperated sigh.

“Yes, yes,” Greg said. “It’s at the Cannon Street Station. Trust me, you’ll know when you’re close.”

Sherlock felt a pit in his stomach. “All I needed to know was Cannon Street.”

“He’s picked another one of your greatest hits, hasn’t he?” Greg said, sounding worried.

“I’m afraid so,” Sherlock said. “Yesterday was the hundredth anniversary of the first of the Grossmont stranglings.”

“Damn,” Greg said. There was a sigh. “I doubt there’s a soul in the Yard who remembers that case, aside from you.”

“No,” Sherlock said. “Both of the detectives involved died recently. My adversary is getting crafty. He’s picking cases where I’m the only living soul alive to know all the details, and where the chances of the official records of the cases having been salvaged are slim. The last ‘greatest hit’ of mine, as you called it, that he copied was one of the first cases I consulted on. All the records were lost to a fire. We only had my own notes, and as I was young and foolish I didn’t take a great many of those. Fortunately I have an excellent memory, even after all these years.”

“Let’s just pray you catch this bastard before your memory fails or you stumble across your soul mate,” Greg said. “Lord knows what will happen if we lose you before he’s behind bars or buried six feet under.”

Sherlock was silent for a long moment. He’d often thought about that, about what might happen in this game of cat and mouse if he found his soul mate and began to grow old. He was in the stasis that all people who hadn’t encountered their soul mate were in, where he had stopped aging at the age of eighteen, both in physical appearance and mental acuity. He was not young in face but feeble in mind, despite being nearly two centuries old. He considered it a blessing more than a curse, though many who had the longevity that he and his brother had had considered the long years a punishment. He preferred to be alone, and so not having found his soul mate was fine by him. So long as he did not lose his brilliant mind before he caught this bastard he would be fine. After that…well, after that, it would not matter so much. Eventually his brother would be gone, and it would not be fair to begrudge his best friend the chance to find love, hopeless romantic that John was. Perhaps when he was completely alone in the world, then it would be all right to forget the long years behind him.

But not now. Now he needed his mind to be as sharp as ever.

He went back to the conversation. “Are you still at the scene?” he asked.

“Yeah, much to your brother’s dismay. I may pop back home to freshen up, but after that I’m off to go talk to the victim’s family and see what I can find out about her nightly routine.”

“I’ll be there shortly,” he said.

“Fine,” Greg said. “And Sherlock?”

“Yes?” Sherlock asked.

“Just fair warning. There’s a new girl at Barts. She’s actually quite nice. Don’t scare her off, all right?”

Sherlock scowled even though his brother-in-law couldn’t see him. “How much do you have riding on it?” he asked.

“Nothing,” he said with a laugh. “But Anderson says you’ll scare her off in a week and Sally says two and I don’t think you want to give either of them the satisfaction.”

Sherlock considered things. No, he didn’t want to particularly give either of those fools the satisfaction of being right about him. “I suppose I can temper my ego and irritation,” he said.

“Good. Besides, I think she’s got a hidden backbone made of steel. She may surprise you.” There was a pause as Greg talked to someone near him. “When should I expect you?” he asked when he got back to Sherlock.

“Forty minutes or so,” he said.

“I’ll see you then,” Greg said before hanging up.

Sherlock looked at the clock on his mobile. John would not appreciate being awoken so early in the morning; one of the things that had carried over from his days in the Victorian era was a general desire to rise as late as possible, and considering it wasn’t even six thirty in the morning he’d be quite irritated and he wouldn’t be at all shy in letting him know. He would have to go to the scene on his own. As he went to change out of his pyjamas and dressing gown he began to gird himself up. It was going to be a very long day.


	3. Chapter 3

He made his way to Barts as soon as he had gotten everything he could from the scene at Cannon Street Station. He’d heard rumblings the last few times that he’d been there that there was going to be a new head of the forensic pathology department but he hadn’t paid it much mind. He’d been through more pathologists than he cared to remember over the hundred plus years he’d been a consulting detective. If he’d had the inclination to he could have easily done the schooling and done their job just as well as they did but he preferred to use his mind in other ways. The stimulation from trying to deduce some of the greatest criminal minds of nearly two hundred years was much more up his alley than dissecting dead bodies and studying them.

He was quite proud of his record when it came to the crimes he’d helped solve. His one biggest regret was that even he hadn’t been able to crack the Jack the Ripper case, no matter how hard he’d tried, but there had been so many potential Jack the Rippers he’d stopped before they’d gotten to that point that he didn’t feel as bad as he could. This killer, though, the Anniversary Killer…he was a menace. He’d followed him around the world, tracking him when he popped up, but he was a tricky bastard. He had two entirely different MOs: there were the kills he did that were uniquely his, the ones he did away from London, and then there were the copycat kills he did on the streets of London to taunt him in this sick game they’d been playing for well over a century now.

He was tired of it, and he wanted it to stop. And if this newest woman didn’t have answers and was going to be a millstone around his neck then so help him he’d run her out like he had so many others. He’d just wait at least three weeks.

The outside of the hospital had not changed much over the years but the interior had, and he braced himself for the momentary sense of nostalgia that swept over him as he entered the wing that would take him to the morgue. He had seen it change over the years to the very sleek, very hygienic medical suite it was now, and this was one of the few improvements to Barts he approved of. He pushed open the double doors and strode inside, annoyed that he couldn’t see anyone. She should be there working, he thought to himself.

“I’ll be out in a minute!” he heard a cheery voice call out, and then about a minute later a woman came into the room. He looked into her face and then froze, seeing the same wide-eyed expression on her very young looking face that he knew he wore. He could feel, through every fiber of his being, deep in his bones, that she was his soul mate. He could feel a pull towards this woman, with her brown hair pulled back in a sleek ponytail and her cherry print jumper and khaki slacks and lab coat and her kind brown eyes staring at him in confusion, a pull he couldn’t ignore. She was the woman he’d been waiting for for nearly two hundred years. “You…you aren’t Sherlock Holmes, are you?” she asked cautiously.

“Yes,” he said with a curt nod.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she muttered under her breath, hanging her head and covering her eyes with a hand, and he blinked. That had not been the reaction he had been hoping for when he finally met his soul mate. He’d been hoping for something maybe a bit more…well, he wasn’t sure, but _this_ certainly hadn’t been it.

“Excuse me?” he asked, his jaw dropping.

“I’m all for an arrogant, Mr. Darcy-esque love interest in the stories I read, but in real life it’s more problematic,” she said, lifting her head up. “And you’re supposed to be one of the biggest arseholes in the whole of London. So of _course_ you’d end up being my soul mate. That’d be just my rotten luck.”

He stared at her incredulously. “Well, _I_ certainly didn’t expect the woman I’ve waited nearly two hundred years for to be so impertinent and judgmental,” he snapped. “No wonder you used Fitzwilliam Darcy as an example. I’ve never met a clearer example of Elizabeth Bennett in my entire life, and I was born during the Regency Era!”

The woman glared at him. “Elizabeth Bennett is a good person,” she said.

“No. _Jane_ is the good sister, the pure and nice one. Elizabeth is the one who is judgmental and flawed but overall a decent person who can grow. The whole point of the story is that she learns to be better, as does Darcy, and they find happiness with each other,” he said. “My mother was a friend of Miss Austen’s and she made sure I read all of her books and understood them well. I’m actually displeased that it was impossible for me to make her acquaintance while she was alive. I would have liked to have met her.”

That appeared to draw the woman up short. She stared at him for a moment and then looked away. “I suppose this all went to hell rather quickly,” she said, sounding a bit placated. “And it was the absolute worst way to introduce myself. I’m Molly Hooper.”

Sherlock nodded. “I’d say pleasure, but all things considered…”

“Well, you do have a reputation,” she pointed out.

“One you’ve obviously let sway you without any regard for meeting me first,” he said, crossing his arms. “Not even considering the fact we’re soul mates appears to have changed that. We’re supposed to be predisposed to love each other and you seem not to be able to stand me.”

He watched her clench her fists slightly. “Do you want me to apologize?” she asked, her tone even but with an underlying hint of anger.

He studied her. To be honest, there was no point in continuing this right now. He needed information. “If you feel the need,” he said with a shrug.

“I apologize,” she said.

“Accepted,” he said. “I need information on the Anniversary Killer’s victim.” She gave him a look of confusion. “The woman found at Cannon Street Station. She was killed to reenact the hundredth anniversary of a serial killer case I helped solve. It’s all part of a damn game I’ve been involved in for nearly a hundred and fifty years.”

Her eyes widened and then she went to the refrigeration unit and pulled a woman’s body out for him. “Here she is,” Molly said.

Sherlock began to examine the corpse, occasionally using his pocket magnifier in his examinations. With a sigh he finished nearly a half hour later. “Damn,” he murmured.

“What is it?” she asked. 

“It’s definitely the same killer who I’ve been dealing with,” he said, motioning for her to come closer. He took his pocket magnifier and showed her three raised bumps on the inside of the victim’s ankle. “He pricks them with something just before they die, causing them to have that reaction. It’s always on a different place on the body, but every kill, whether it’s a copycat kill or an original kill, has that mark. It’s his signature.”

“And you’ve been chasing him for a hundred and fifty years?” Molly asked.

“Just about,” he said with a nod. “And now it’s imperative I stop him, or else there might be grave consequences.” She gave him a confused look. “We’ve met. That means I no longer have my functional eternal youth. As of this moment, I’m going to start aging. Which means eventually—“

“Eventually you’ll die,” she said quietly.

“And if I die before he’s caught, he’ll keep killing and I won’t be there to stop him, and then he might escalate.” He stowed his magnifier. “I need to go speak with Greg. This has just become a much bigger problem.” He turned away from the body and made his way to the doors, stopping when he heard her clear her throat. “Yes?” he asked.

“What about us?” she asked.

“That depends,” he asked, turning to face her. “Do you actually _want_ to get to know me?”

“I suppose I should,” she said.

“Quo Vadis tonight, then,” he said. “Seven PM. Dress nicely.”

She raised an eyebrow. “You could actually ask _nicely_ , you know.”

“Well, you expected me to be an arsehole. I’m just living up to expectations a little longer.” He turned again and left the morgue, a curious sense of excitement bubbling up in him that he hadn’t expected. He had never honestly thought this day would come. And she might not like him, but he would attempt to try and be nice, be sociable, be all the things he used to be so long ago but had suppressed for a hundred and fifty years. If she could give him a chance to at least try, he would.


	4. Chapter 4

He went back to Baker Street as soon as he was able, a lightness in his step he hadn’t felt in ages. There would be problems if he didn’t solve this case; his life was on a timer, now, a tipped over hourglass with the sand running down. And there was the small matter that his soul mate didn’t seem to care for him much.

Small matter. Not insurmountable.

He supposed this was how his brother had felt when he’d met Greg, he thought. Neither Mycroft nor himself had much cared to meet their soul mates. They’d have preferred the functional immortality even if it meant to live their lives looking as though they were teenagers fresh out of secondary school, right on their way to university. They had both managed to do great things in their lives, he in his consulting detective business and Mycroft in the world of politics, and he had thought neither had felt anything was missing with the lack of a soul mate.

But when Mycroft had met Gregory Richard Lestrade in the early 1970s after coming in to check on his baby brother during a close call on a case, he had noticed a change in his brother. His demeanour had seemed less prickly. He had seemed less overtly hostile. He even seemed less inclined to snoop and swoop, as John had termed it, to use surveillance and then pick the worst time to swoop in for a chat. And it was all because Greg was Mycroft’s soul mate. Greg softened the rough edges of Mycroft’s nature and…well, Sherlock had never been sure what Mycroft did for Greg, to be honest, and he wasn’t sure he _wanted_ to know particulars. Their relationship was their business and as long as they were happy that was all he cared about. He might not act as though he liked his brother but they were family and he did have some slight fondness for him. Now it was his turn, nearly thirty years later. He wondered what types of changes Miss Hooper might bring about in him.

He let himself into the flat at Baker Street and smelled back bacon and eggs and coffee. Good. John was awake. He made his way up to the sitting room and kitchen and saw his friend at the stove in nothing more than pyjama bottoms, dish towel over his bare shoulder. He was in a jovial mood, laughing, a bit of morning’s growth on his chin and cheeks.

He was also not alone, as there was a woman with short blonde hair wearing nothing but one of his plain white T-shirts over a black lace bra and a pair of black lace knickers lounging against the worktop, mug of coffee in her hands. She noticed him first and her eyes widened slightly as she nudged John with her elbow. He looked over at Sherlock and then his eyes got wide. “Bloody hell,” he said.

“You’re over two hundred years old,” Sherlock said with a shrug. “If you want to bring a wanton woman into the flat by all means, you may do so.”

“Sherlock, this is Mary. Mary Morstan. Mary’s my…err…” he said, setting the spatula down and running a hand through his hair. “She’s my soul mate, mate.”

Sherlock narrowed his eyes at her as she gave him a grin and a wave, and then Sherlock turned his gaze to John and really studied him. They couldn’t have known for long; he could see the slight signs of aging now that he was studying John closely, but no more than…a month. Two at most. “I see,” he murmured.

“Look, I know it’s a bit of a shock,” John said as Mary reached over to turn off the heat under the food so it didn’t burn. “You and I, we’ve been together a long time, over a hundred and fifty years, and—”

“I met my soul mate this morning,” Sherlock said, waving his hand.

“Oh,” John said, letting out a slight sigh of relief. “That’s good.”

“She dislikes me. Thinks I’m arrogant and rude. Compared me to Fitzwilliam Darcy,” he continued.

“Bit not good,” John said with a frown.

“Not important,” Sherlock said. “The Anniversary Killer struck again.”

John immediately got a serious look on his face. Then he turned to Mary. “Breakfast is going to have to wait, dear.”

“It’s all right,” she said, leaning in to kiss his cheek. “I can go in to the surgery and tell them you’re on a case and rearrange your schedule for you. I’ll pick up something on the way. Should I tell Molly she’ll have company at home tonight?”

“Molly?” Sherlock asked, frowning.

“My roommate, Molly Hooper,” Mary said.

“She’ll be dining with me tonight,” he said quietly.

Mary’s eyes widened. “Oh bloody hell. _Molly’s_ your soul mate?” She chuckled at that. “Oh, I...oh. Oh dear.”

“Oh dear what?” Sherlock said, his eyes narrowing again.

John looked down, somewhat embarrassed. “I _may_ have told them stories of what you’ve been like over the time we’ve been friends,” he said. “When I’ve been over at their home. And they haven’t all been exactly…flattering.”

Sherlock turned to his best friend and glared at him. “You should be quite glad, John, that we no longer live in an era of pistols at dawn. As it stands, we’ll be chatting. _At length_.” He turned and made his way to the sitting room. “Begin to get ready, John. We have things to do today and time is running out.” He flopped down in his chair and then steepled his hands together in front of his face. He knew he should concentrate on the case but the fact that the entire reason his soul mate thought he was an arrogant arse was because of the picture painted by his best friend…he wasn’t quite sure what to think now. He wasn’t quite sure what to think at all, and that was not the state of mind he needed to be in at the moment.


	5. Chapter 5

Sherlock and John began to delve into the life of the victim, an Emmeline Hartford, but they were finding no reasons why she would be picked as the victim other than being at the wrong place at the wrong time by the end of it all. Sherlock let them both into Baker Street that evening in a foul mood, almost stomping back into the sitting room and flopping onto the sofa.

“Are you going to be in another one of your moods?” John asked as his mobile rang.

“What moods?” Sherlock asked sourly, grabbing a pillow off the sofa and dropping it on his face.

“Never mind, the answer is yes,” John said, shaking his head with a small grin on his face and then answering his mobile. “Hello?” he asked and then he moved away from the sitting room, leaving Sherlock in peace and quiet, but just for a moment before the pillow got lifted up off his face and John looked down at him. “He’ll make it up to her.”

Sherlock glared at him. “I’ll make what up to whom?” he asked.

“You’ll make standing Molly up at Quo Vadis tonight to her,” John said sternly while still on the phone with who he assumed was Mary.

His eyes widened. _Bloody hell, the date,_ he thought to himself as he sat up. “Where is she?” he asked.

“On her way back to her flat,” John said.

“Where is her flat?” Sherlock asked.

John raised an eyebrow. “Why?” he asked slowly.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Forget it. Brother-in-law’s a copper, I’ll ask him,” he said. “Tell Mary to come over here. Molly may want to yell for a while, which is her right, I suppose.” He went back to the foyer and grabbed his coat. Oh, he’d made a mess of this. His brother would probably be downright gleeful if he knew. He pulled his own mobile out.

John came down to the foyer. “Sherlock?”

“Yes?” he said, his tone clipped as he began to dial his brother-in-law’s personal mobile number.

“ _I’ll_ go to their flat. Mary said she’ll text Molly and have her come here. But you better be sincere. And not that fake sincere you fob off on people when you want something.” He had his hand up, hovering over his shoulder a moment, and then set it down, gripping it lightly. “I know you’ve shut yourself off since Cha—” Sherlock shrugged John’s hand off his shoulder roughly and John stopped mid sentence. He didn’t want to hear her name. A hundred and fifty years later and he’d finally found his soul mate and he _still_ didn’t want to hear her name. But John simply nodded. “Just remember. Molly’s very sweet and very understanding but _you’re_ the one who fucked up.”

“Yes, I know,” he said quietly. “I’ll grovel.”

“You? Grovel?” John was surprised. “I _almost_ want to stick around to see this.” Sherlock glared. “Almost. I’ll be on my way, then.” He grabbed his coat and put it on over his jumper and, after giving Sherlock a wave, made his way out the door.

Sherlock realized he had his coat draped over his arm and his mobile in his hand still. He pocketed his mobile and then hung his coat back up, and then went into the kitchen to begin making tea. He should at least have tea ready for Molly if she wanted some. At least, if she didn’t just yell at him and then leave. Even he knew proper date etiquette was to not stand a woman up on their first date without calling, though he didn’t have her phone number, so there was that.

He’d just gotten everything set when there was a knock at the door. Not a furious banging, though not a timid knock either. He made his way downstairs and smoothed down his suit before opening the door and immediately stared, slackjawed. She looked quite stunning. Even if she was going under some duress, even if she wasn’t looking forward to the date, she had certainly gone all out for it. Her dress was black lace over a nude lining, with a halter neckline that accentuated small but pert cleavage and a wide matte gold ribbon around the waist. She had a matching lace wrap around her shoulders but no coat, which he’d almost think was foolish this time of year if he wasn’t busy admiring her lovely shoulders and toned arms. She had black onyx earrings dangling from her ears, and she’d pulled her hair back into a French twist of some sort that left her neck tantalizingly bare.

He hadn’t had thoughts of this nature in a hundred and fifty years and from the rather irate look on her face he certainly shouldn’t be having them now.

“Molly—” he began, but she shook her head.

“I was there for forty-five minutes before they told me you hadn’t even phoned in a reservation,” she said, her voice humming with anger. “I was so embarrassed. I looked so absolutely pathetic, waiting for you when you didn’t even have the decency to save a table for us. After I went through all this trouble!” She stepped past him into his home and then whirled around to face him. “I don’t care if you _are_ my soul mate, I deserve better than this.”

“Absolutely,” he said.

She blinked. “What?”

“I…was distracted. I let the case consume me. It didn’t help that I found out that John played a large part in convincing you that I’m an arrogant arsehole, though I admit tonight’s turn of events didn’t help. I had made tea but as you look quite stunning tonight I would like it if you would allow me to take you somewhere else. Kettner’s, if you’d like? I can pull strings with my brother’s name, perhaps.”

“Oh, I…um…” she said. “Stunning?”

He nodded. “Quite.”

She blushed slightly. “Are you saying that to get me to not be mad at you?”

“I don’t give compliments easily. You can ask John; he’ll tell you that. But…you do look quite breathtaking. I could probably write a sonnet or two if I chose.”

Her blush deepened. “Oh.”

“You probably don’t want me to. Just because I _could_ doesn’t mean they would turn out well. I have the brain of a scientist, not the heart of a poet.”

“I see.” She studied him. “Can you cook?”

He nodded. “Decently enough. My parent’s cook taught me well, and I’ve supplemented my skills with lessons from others.”

“Then maybe we could stay here and you could cook and go over the case with me,” she said.”

He was quiet a moment, rather stunned at the suggestion. “You _want_ to go over the case?”

“Well, it _is_ quite fascinating, and you have history with the killer. And it’s the sort of thing that would put other diners off their meals, if you get into the gory bits.”

He studied her. “But not you,” he said.

She shook her head. “I’ve been doing postmortems for a little while now.”

“When were you born?” he asked curiously.

“1981,” she said. “I realize I’m quite a bit younger than you are, so that statement seems rather stupid. But I was rather bright, and I skipped a few grades in school, so I went into uni early and…” She trailed off. “You don’t want to hear about that right now.”

“On the contrary,” he said, holding out a hand for her wrap. She took it off and he hung it on the coat rack before gesturing up the stairs to the sitting room and kitchen. “I’d like to learn as much about you as possible.” 

She gave him a grin before continuing with what she was saying as they made their way up the stairs. They’d get to talking about the case and the killer and all that eventually, but for now, perhaps he’d learn more about Molly and she’d learn more about him and they could move forward on a better note from here on out.


	6. Chapter 6

**April 1st, 2008**

She was mesmerizing, in all senses of the word.

They’d talked about the case a bit the night before but mostly he’d listened. He was not the type to actually want to listen unless he was observing someone or gathering facts for a case but she’d shared stories and he’d listened to her every word. And she’d prodded him to tell her stories of his life, of the things he’d seen. They’d barely scratched the surface of his life; he had two hundred years to go through compared to her twenty-seven, but there would be other times. He was rather sure of that now.

But not this time. This time, they were going to focus on the case.

Greg and John were joining them for lunch to ensure they stayed on task, and the four of them were going to meet at the Pret A Manger closest to Barts since Molly couldn’t take quite as much time away as everyone else. Greg had made no more headway on things then they had, so he reckoned having an extra set of eyes and opinions couldn’t do any harm.

John had said he’d get the four of them a table while Sherlock went to go get Molly. Sherlock had been hesitant to tell Greg that Molly was his soul mate; John knowing was one thing, because he’d have found out regardless since his soul mate was Molly’s roommate, but Greg had ties to the investigation and he wasn’t sure he wanted it being public knowledge. It seemed that it was something that, for the time being, should be kept as quiet as possible, and he wanted to tell that to Molly now, while they had some privacy.

She was in the office, taking off her lab coat and readjusting her ponytail when he came in. “Sherlock!” she said, giving him a smile. “Didn’t realize I was getting an escort.”

“I just thought we could talk for a moment,” he said, studying her. She had on another rather colorful jumper, this one with sunflowers and daisies. While he missed the dress she had worn last night, he could appreciate the jumper, he found. It had a certain charm to it.

She gave him an amused smile. “You don’t want me to broadcast we’re soul mates,” she said, crossing her arms under her bosom.

“I would appreciate that, yes,” he said, slightly confused. “Aren’t you going to ask why?”

“Sherlock, you have a killer who’s been playing a game of cat and mouse with you for you said nearly a hundred and fifty years now,” she said. “I would lay good money down on the odds that if he knew you found your soul mate then he or she would have a gigantic target on their back, and as I’m not in the mood to be used as bait I have no problem with only John and Mary knowing for the time being.” 

He relaxed. He was, he supposed, far luckier than he’d ever hoped he had any right to be. “Thank you,” he said gratefully.

“Well, you can make it up to me by taking me out on an _actual_ date when you’ve caught the bastard,” she said. “For now, I’m just assisting in the course of the investigations as an…additional expert consultant.” She hung her lab coat up and reached for her regular coat. “So let’s get going. I’m starved.”

He nodded and let her lead the way out of the hospital. It was only a three minute walk to the restaurant. John was there and they found Greg was as well. The two of them had already placed their orders. John had gone for a Ham, Cheese & Mustard Toastie, Japanese miso soup and on the barista’s advice a Love Bar Latte while Greg had opted for the Swedish Meatball Hot Wrap, Tuscan minestrone soup and a macchiato. Sherlock thought the drink choice was definitely his brother’s doing, as Mycroft had become a coffee snob over the last few years.

He had never really been to the establishment, so he watched Molly place her order for a Chicken Avocado sandwich, South Indian Tomato & Spice Soup and a Passion Pop smoothie before he ordered the Classic Super Club, South Indian Tomato & Spice Soup & a black filter coffee. “My tastes must seem dull to you,” he said, pulling out his credit card to pay for their orders.

“I don’t know,” she said with a small smile. “I have the feeling there are a few things about you that would surprise me.” Then she leaned in more. “Hopefully you’ll let me find out sometime soon.” When she pulled back her smile had widened and he grinned a bit more to himself as he waited for his card to be returned to him. He had been flirted with many times in the last few years. Only once before had it mattered, had he actually been open to it. It seemed as though this time, with this woman, it meant something, and it was…nice.

They all moved to a table to wait for their various orders and settled in. Much to his annoyance, though he couldn’t show it, John sat to his side and Molly sat next to Greg. She gave him a slightly commiserating look as she settled into her seat before she set her hands on the table. “So you and this killer have quite a bit of history,” she said.

Sherlock nodded. “His first murder was just over a hundred and fifty years ago this week. A hundred and fifty three, I believe.” He was quiet for a moment as he thought about the occasion, the place and everything. “It was a murder at the Church of St Michael and All Angels, in the village of Haworth in Yorkshire. There was a burial that was to take place in a few days time and…it was a rather gruesome message.”

“Who was to be buried?” Greg asked.

Sherlock was quiet for a moment, and John glanced over before speaking. “Charlotte Brontë. She’d died a few days prior.”

“That’s a rather bold statement,” Molly said. “Wasn’t she well known by then?” 

John nodded as Sherlock looked down at his coffee. “Well, you have to realize at the time she’d only recently come out as the author of her own novels. When she was first published she did so under a pseudonym. It was after Shirley came out that Charlotte started to come to London and we knew that she had written the books. She was quite well liked by the time she died. Quite popular.”

Greg and Molly stared at the two of them slightly. “You both knew her?” Greg asked.

Sherlock nodded slowly. “Yes,” he said. “We were friendly, both John and I, with her, as well as others in her circle of friends and acquaintances.”

“Your brother never mentioned that,” Greg said with a grin.

“He wouldn’t,” Sherlock said. “Anyway, back to the point. I declined to work on the case, as she was…dear to me, and I was grieving her sudden death. At least at first. The inspector on the case was not happy with me, but another woman turned up dead in London three weeks later near the docks and that caught my attention. Alas, there were no other bodies, so the case grew cold. But that was my first encounter with the killer.”

Molly frowned. “So…he kills more often than just recreating the killings in time for your anniversaries?”

Sherlock nodded. “He only started doing those about a hundred years ago. Maybe more than that. But he…or possibly she, I’ve never been able to get a gauge on that…has been killing since April 3rd, 1855. Every kill, though, regardless if it’s an original killing or a copycat, is marked with three raised dots in the shape of a triangle somewhere on the victims body.”

“Is there anything else that connects all the victims?” Molly asked.

“They’re all women,” Sherlock said. “All except two, but those two men were found to have been in the wrong place at the wrong time and were only killed to allow the killer to escape, which is the only reason I’m inclined to believe the killer is a man.” He sighed. “I’ve been chasing this spectre for a hundred and fifty years now. More than that. And he’s always just one step ahead of me.”

“Well, there are four of us putting our heads together on this,” Greg said, flashing a grin. “I’m sure we can get some headway on this you didn’t get before. And you’ve got time, right?”

Sherlock risked a glance at Molly, who had stilled. “Yes, I suppose,” he said. At that moment Greg and John’s orders were called and the two men got up to get them. Molly looked over at them quickly, and then reached across the table to take Sherlock’s hands in hers. He glanced down at them. “Yes?”

“You do still have time,” she said. “It’s not like you’re going to age all two hundred years in one night.” She squeezed his hands and when he looked up she gave him a smile. “Besides, we’re all pretty damn smart. I think we can help you crack it.”

“I hope so,” he said. After a moment he decided to lift her hand up and brush his lips across her knuckles, a gesture that, in his time, had meant affection. She blushed slightly at that and grinned more widely before she pulled away as John and Greg started to return to the table. By the time they got back there was just a trace amount of colour on her cheeks. Greg settled in next to her and John next to him. “Looks like your food will be done soon,” John said.

“Good,” Molly said. “I’m starved and I have a long day ahead of me.”

“Maybe Sherlock and I can come over and spend time with you and Mary,” John said before taking a bite of his sandwich.

“Well, I wouldn’t mind,” she said with a nod. “I can see about picking something up at the market. Anything in particular you’d like?”

“Your chicken parmesan?” John suggested.

Greg looked between the two of them. “You know, I didn’t realize you two were chummy.”

John looked a bit embarrassed. “You’ll find out soon enough. Molly’s roommate is my soul mate.”

“Congratulations, I suppose,” Greg said, eyeing Sherlock.

Sherlock nodded. “It’s a good thing,” Sherlock said. “I’m happy for him. He deserves to have love in his life after all these years of me.”

“Well, then, congratulations,” Greg said, his tone getting warmer.

“Thanks, mate,” John said with a grin. John looked over at Sherlock. “So why don’t we go back to the case, yeah? There’s a lot we need to go over.”

“Yes,” Sherlock said. “Especially since there’s supposed to be another victim tomorrow night.”

“Then by all means, let’s get to work,” Molly said as Sherlock’s name was called. “I’ll get the food and then we can get down to business.”

Molly went to the counter and Greg leaned in towards Sherlock. “Are you…are you sure you’re going to be fine, Sherlock?”

“Greg, I’ll be perfectly fine,” he said, letting out an exasperated sigh. “The case is more important than my personal life at the moment. Let’s focus on that, shall we?” He disliked leaving his brother-in-law in the dark, and he would make sure Greg and Mycroft were the first to know when it was safe to tell them but, for now, it was best if they just assumed Sherlock was going to be miserable and alone. If it kept Molly safe then that was what they should do.


	7. Chapter 7

After the four of them had gone over everything, every last detail, and plans had been made for the tube station where the second victim of the Grossmont strangling had been found all those years ago to be put under heavy surveillance in case the killer attempted to replicate the crime the next day, there didn’t seem to be much else to do other than to wait. It was, so far as Sherlock could tell, a near perfect crime. In fact, it was even better than the original crime as there was no trace of the Anniversary Killer on it at all, aside from the three raised dots on the victim.

He accompanied Molly back to the morgue and left her there with the promise that this evening he would not leave her and Mary waiting before going back to John. They went through their files on the killings, files which he had to admit were scarce; it hadn’t been until John had gotten an offer from The Strand Magazine to start publishing their exploits after his sister sold letters to them that he had sent her for money for the drink that they began keeping better notes of their cases. Now, with the advent of computers and websites meant for this blogging phenomenon and the rise of people interested in the details of true crime, John’s works were incredibly popular. He was worth quite a packet due to Mycroft’s careful negotiations.

Still, at the end of the day it was the cases that gave them both the thrill, but he supposed with everything, that might be coming to an end. As they let themselves into Baker Street he lapsed into silence and made his way into the sitting room, wanting to ask the obvious questions but also not wanting to think about what the answers to those obvious questions would mean. But John wasn’t going to let him get away with that, he realized as John blocked his way to his bedroom, crossing his arms. “Out with it, Sherlock.”

Sherlock stared at him a moment, then went to his chair and sat down. John moved to sit across from him. “When were you going to tell me about Mary?” he asked.

“Soon,” John said, at least having the decency to look guilty. “I…I wasn’t sure when. But I knew I had to tell you. It wasn’t fair to you.”

“Even if I hadn’t found out Molly was my soul mate?” he asked. John nodded. Sherlock steepled his fingers together and then leaned back. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I was so wrapped up in it all,” John said. “Just…Mary’s wonderful. She’s the perfect woman for me, she really is. It was all like everyone said it would be, that you really do feel like you find your other half. And I was just so… _happy_ , you know? And you didn’t even notice. Didn’t notice a thing. What’s that thing you say…you saw, but you did not observe. And…I guess I figured if you couldn’t tell you wouldn’t understand, and I didn’t know how to tell you, and then I didn’t _want_ to tell you because it meant everything was going to change.”

Sherlock was quiet for a moment. He and John had been bachelors for a long time. They’d been set in their ways for well over a hundred and fifty years and, truthfully, neither of them had really liked change. They’d learned to adapt, they’d made changes, and they’d adapted well for the most part, but they hadn’t always _liked_ the changes they’d had to make. And the changes they would have to make now, while they could be good, would be more drastic than many they had had to make before. He nodded finally and then unsteepled his fingers. “I see,” he said.

“I thought you’d be more upset,” John said, relaxing.

“Truth be told, I probably would have done the same thing,” he admitted. “Men such as we are creatures of habit. Change is not something we like or crave.”

“No, it’s not,” John said with a small smile. “At least not in large, life altering ways.” He tilted his head. “So what did you think of Dr. Morstan?”

“Dr?” Sherlock said, sounding impressed.

John nodded, his grin widening. “She could run the entire damn surgery if she wanted and she’s a nurse while she goes off and gets yet another degree. She’s finishing up a rotation now and then next term she’s starting a new course of study. I just don’t remember if it’s for an MD or a PhD. Something to do with Child Health, though.”

“What’s her current rotation in?” Sherlock asked.

“Women’s Health. She’s done just about every MD and PhD field of study she could at University College, since I think 1917, on a part time basis while still working. That’s how we met. I was visiting one of my friends there and we bumped into each other on campus and I just…knew. And she ended up dragging me to the Bertie and Boo coffee shop in Balham to get some coffee and next thing we knew we were getting into a discussion on who had more degrees and she was saying it wasn’t fair I was nearly a hundred and fifty years older and a male and UCL had only started taking women in 1878 even though she wasn’t born yet and then I just had to kiss her and I was…I was a goner.”

“And who has more degrees?” Sherlock asked.

“She does, because she has twelve and I only have eleven. And she has MDs and PhDs to boot.”

This time Sherlock knew he looked quite impressed. “I think you’ve chosen well, then, from the brief time I spent with her,” he said. “I’m sure I’ll know better after tonight.”

John looked a bit sheepish. “Yeah. Look, Sherlock, I’m sorry I gave her and Molly a not-so-great impression. I mean, not _all_ the stories I said were all that bad. But once the wine was out and I’d had a few glasses and they wanted the _real_ dirt…”

“I suppose they’d have learned that side of me eventually,” he said, his more jovial mood dimming slightly.

“Yeah, but that was all you over corpses and cases and dealing with arrogant stuffed-shirt DIs and stuff,” he said. “I mean, and your brother. You’re a good man. You just…well, after… _her_ , you just…” He trailed off. “Maybe with Molly, maybe if you go back to how you were way back then, you’ll be more…”

“Normal?” Sherlock supplied quietly.

“Not the word I was looking for,” John said.

“But it would fit,” he replied. “I know I’m an arrogant, cold hearted arse. I’ve felt it best to put people at arms length. It’s kept me safe. But, perhaps, it’s time to let people closer. I’ve started with a few, and moreso with Molly. Perhaps I can do more of that with others.”

John nodded. “That’d be a good start.” He nodded towards the washroom. “I’m going to grab a quick shower and shave. Freshen up a bit. We should bring something, like a bottle of wine, so I’ll be quick so we can pick something up.”

Sherlock nodded and watched him get up. He didn’t really feel the need to freshen up, so he stayed in the chair, pondering things: the case, the changes that would be occurring, how he might properly court Molly. By the time John was ready it wouldn’t be long till they needed to be there. Sherlock still didn’t know where the women lived but John did, so they got in a cab and John gave an address in Notting Hill. They got out a few blocks away at a corner market and had the cab wait while they dashed inside for a bottle of wine and a bouquet of flowers from John to Mary, and then they pulled up outside of a building that seemed rather nondescript aside from a red door. 

The two men got out and John bounded up to the door, flowers behind his back while Sherlock carried the wine. He knocked on the door and after a moment Mary opened it, wearing a strapless light blue dress that came down to just above her knees and flared out that appeared to have paint splattered in light green, dark green and dark blue on the bodice and waist and then was more concentrated near the bottom of the skirt. It was held in with a thin patent leather belt at the waist, and she had on white heels as well. “You look smashing,” he said with a grin, leaning in to give her a quick kiss.

“Well, Molly said grown up double dinner date, look my best,” Mary said with a laugh when she pulled away. She turned and then grinned at Sherlock. “I imagine this is more appropriate than La Perla lingerie and a white T-shirt?”

“For a dinner party, yes,” he said, giving her a small grin as John stepped inside. “Molly is…?”

“At the stove, finishing supper,” Mary said. “We were both running late and she said she’d take care of the food while I got ready. Hope you enjoy chicken and quinoa.” Sherlock handed her the wine and her grin got wider. “Oh, this will be nice.”

John and Mary made their way in further and Sherlock followed them. The aroma of the food suggested that there was more to the meal than just chicken, and when they got to the kitchen and dining area he saw that Molly had pulled her ponytail from earlier into a bun but otherwise was still wearing what she had worn to lunch. There was a cast iron skillet on the stove with a butterflied whole chicken in it and what looked like a foil wrapped brick on top of a plate on top of it. To the side he saw a wok with sugar snap peas and peanuts in it. Molly glanced up and groaned. “I’d hoped I’d have enough time to actually look nice,” she said.

“I think you look lovely,” he replied.

“I look like I’ve put in a long day at work and then tried to very quickly make a meal for four after rushing to the market after putting in overtime,” she said, giving him a wry smile. “But thank you for lying.”

“It wasn’t a lie,” he said, reaching over for her hand to grasp it in his and bring her knuckles up to kiss them lightly. When he did that she blushed, ignoring the food on the stove until something began to burn. Her eyes widened. “Damn!” she said, pulling her hand away and eyeing the contents on the stove.

“The peas,” Sherlock said, reaching over to turn the heat off.

She sighed, hanging her head. “I wanted to impress you, too,” she said.

“We can rummage around and find something else,” he said. “But keep an eye on the chicken,” he said.

She nodded and then turned to check on it. “Maybe I can make it up to you with lunch tomorrow? At Barts, in my office?” she asked.

“All right,” he said, going to her cupboards and looking at the contents. “I’ll even be adventurous and let you decide what we eat.”

“Whatever I want?” she asked.

“Whatever you want,” he said, turning to look at her. She looked back at him, surprised. “I’ve decided I need to take a few risks in my life.” She gave him a grin and he grinned back before she turned her attention back to the meal. It would be very interesting to see what tomorrow held, he thought to himself, and to see what happened tonight. Very interesting indeed.


	8. Chapter 8

**April 2nd, 2008**

He had been surprised at himself when he suggested that Molly order their lunch for them. They didn’t know each other’s tastes well and it would be interesting to see what she thought he would like. They barely knew each other, even though there was an incredibly strong attraction that was growing stronger the more time they spent in each other’s company. He supposed that was the way it worked. 

He made his way to the basement and was assaulted by two competing smells: decomposition and Persian food. He was, surprisingly, used to both, but not in such close proximity. He saw Molly was in a cordoned off section, standing near a body and in a biohazard suit, and he stood outside. “Is it a biohazard?” he asked.

She shook her head. “No, but it’s best if you don’t get too close.”

He opened the door and moved towards her but still stayed back. The smell was much stronger, almost overpowering. “How can you stand the abominable smell?” he asked.

She nodded over to the small table by her side, and he dabbed a finger in a small tub of gel and then swiped his finger under his nose. A moment later the smell of decomposing flesh subsided, replaced by the smell of camphor, menthol and eucalyptus oil. “Better?”

“Much,” he said with a nod. He looked at the tub. “What is that?”

“Vicks VapoRub,” she said with a laugh. “Welcome to modern advancements in science.”

“That would have been quite useful over the years,” he said.

“It’s been around since 1905,” she said, shaking her head.

“Well, then that must have been a secret kept from me the last hundred years,” he said, grousing slightly.

“I’m sure,” she said, an amused grin on her face.

He gave her a very mild glare with no real heat behind it before peering at the autopsy she was performing from the side, studying it. “Are the internal organs putrified?”

She nodded. “I was almost tempted to alert the health department but it appears she had sepsis. It doesn’t appear to be anything contagious or else you wouldn’t have been able to come down here. Just a case of an untreated STD wreaking havoc on her body. My guess is tertiary syphilis, specifically gummatous disease, with other illnesses, but…I’m not entirely sure. I’ll have to do lab work to pin it down.” She zipped up the containment bag the body was in before putting it back in the refrigeration unit. Then she nodded towards her office. “I had one of the interns place the order. It should be in the office.”

“It is,” he said with a nod.

“Excellent,” she said with a smile. “Let me clean myself up a bit and I’ll join you in there.” She gave him a slight shove towards her office and he went in that direction while she went towards where he assumed there was a locker room of some sort. There were a few plastic sacks sitting on the desk, but those did not attract his attention. What did get his attention where the photographs. He kept very few photographs in his home, though he did have a portrait of his mother and father, or rather the outtake of one, hidden away in his bedroom. Back when they were alive, people posing for portraits had to remain still for a long period, and there had been a moment where his father had kissed his mother that had been caught on film. His brother had wanted to get rid of it, saying it was not a proper photograph of them, but he had rescued it from the rubbish heap. Even after all these years, he had kept it. John had filled their sitting room with photographs, but there were none that were special to him. Photographs were simply reminders of people no longer a part of his life, for one reason or another. He did not need such reminders about.

But Molly did. There was many of them, in the collage frames that were popular. He did not know who they were but he could see familial resemblences in some of them. Mother and father, he assumed…perhaps a sister or aunt as well. With the way people did not age it was hard to tell. He had picked up one photo of Molly and a young looking woman when she came back in. “Sister?” he asked.

“Mother,” she said, adjusting her ponytail before smoothing down her shirt. She wasn’t wearing a jumper today but her shirt had a floral pattern on it. He must have looked surprised because she chuckled. “She’s an Anomaly. She had two soul mates.”

“Ah,” he said with a nod. Though no one knew how to explain it, there were, at times, genetic anomalies to the soul mate way of life. Some people were born with two soul mates. Some people never met theirs. Some people’s soul mates were not meant to return their bond. Still others physically did not age at all until their soul mate died. No one could explain the Anomalies or why they happened. Most just accepted them as best they could, depending on the severity of their anomaly. “So your stepmother is your mother’s other soul mate.”

Molly nodded. “My mum was quite lucky she didn’t have to wait a very long time to meet her second soul mate. And I love Laura a lot, almost as much as I loved my Dad. I’m lucky to have her in my life.”

Sherlock had known that her mother had remarried after her father had died, but she hadn’t realized all of Molly’s parental figures had been mated to each other. She was incredibly lucky as, for the most part, those relationships were deep and caring. There were occasional horror stories of abusive relationships between soul mates, but they were usually between two sociopaths or psychopaths to begin with. Still, Molly had been quite lucky. “I hope one day I’ll get to meet both of them.”

“Probably sooner rather than later,” she said with a smile. “I know both of my mums have been quite anxious for me to find my soul mate. My sister Priscilla found hers when she was twenty-one and then she got married at twenty-three. Now that she’s thirty-three and she’s already given them three grandchildren they’ve been on me to try harder, look harder.”

Sherlock grinned as he began to poke around the plastic sacks. “I hope they don’t expect us to get married right away. I expect to at least be able to properly court you first.”

“Don’t Victorian courtships take forever and a day?” she asked in a teasing voice. “And we have to have chaperones and all that?”

“Well, this is a lunch date and there isn’t a chaperone in sight,” he pointed out. “So I suppose I’m taking a more modern approach to things.”

“That’s just because we’re being discrete because there’s a deranged killer on the loose,” she said.

He sobered slightly. “Well, there is that,” he said in agreement.

She moved over and stood in front of him, reaching over for his hands. “I don’t mind keeping things under wraps for now. I don’t, honest, even though I’ll tease. But eventually, I’d like to tell my mum and Laura. I’d like to go out on a proper date, and have a proper kiss and all that.”

He hesitated. “I could give you a proper kiss now, if you’d like,” he said quietly, clasping her hands more tightly in his, pulling her just a little closer.

“Doesn’t that go against your Victorian morals?” she teased, though she stepped closer.

“The last time I looked at a calendar it was 2008, not 1888,” he said, giving her a small grin as he let go of her hands to settle his hands on her waist.

“Have you ever kissed a woman, Sherlock?” she asked, moving her arms to put them around his neck.

“A very long time ago,” he said. “So perhaps it might be best if _you_ kissed _me._ ”

She nodded. “All right,” she said softly, leaning in and standing on her toes to gain some height as he leaned his head down. She softly brushed her lips against his, pressing them lightly, but it felt as though the was a small jolt of electricity between them and then she was wrapping her arms tighter as he slid his hands around to the small of her back, keeping her close, not wanting to let her go as she opened her mouth to him.

They kissed until they needed air and then, with the utmost reluctance, they pulled apart, just far enough to look at each other, gaze at each other’s eyes. She had a smile on her face that he couldn’t describe, something that showed she was pleased and that she was bewildered at the same time, and he was fairly sure the same grin was on his own face. He wasn’t sure whether they would concentrate on the food or each other, but one thing was for sure: from this point forward, nothing would ever be the same again.


	9. Chapter 9

There were officers from New Scotland Yard all over Blackfriars Station, keeping an eye out for anything out of the ordinary. Today was the anniversary of when the second victim of the Grossmont strangling had been found, and every precaution was to be taken. There were men and women to be posted at all exits throughout the day and well into the night, all the way until the time the body had been discovered at 4:37 AM. If the killer was holding true to his pattern, one he’d held true to for many years, he would make a play that evening.

Greg stuck a cigarette in his mouth, shielding it from the light drizzle that had been going on since early that afternoon with his hand. “God, I hate rain on a stakeout,” he said, keeping an eye on the entrance to the station.

Sherlock popped the collar of his Belstaff up. “Hopefully he’ll still be foolish enough to turn up tonight,” he said. He glanced askance at the cigarette. “Mycroft will be upset.”

“For your information I’m allowed half a pack on a stakeout and that’s it,” he said, inhaling the smoke. He pulled the cigarette out from between his lips and exhaled. “The only thing that’s more stressful than coordinating a stakeout, especially one on this scale, are dinners with the Queen. She’s a true crime fanatic. She always wants the gory bits. I always feel like I disappoint her unless I tell her stories about your cases, and your brother hates hearing them.”

Sherlock smiled a smug smile. “Serves him right.”

Greg shook his head. “One day, you know, he’s not going to be here. Your brother and I…we’re getting older. You two should make your peace.”

“We’re peaceable enough,” Sherlock said, looking away towards the entrance to the station.

“What’s going to happen when John’s gone, Sherlock?” Greg asked before putting the cigarette between his lips again. “I mean, are you _really_ going to be all right on your own? You’ve always had someone, you know. I mean, I haven’t been around as long as your brother and John, but…”

“I’ll be fine,” he said brusquely.

He pulled the cigarette away and exhaled. “Yeah but—”

“Gregory,” Sherlock said, his tone low, his voice quiet.

“I’m just trying to—” This time Sherlock clamped a hand over his brother-in-law’s mouth and forcibly turned his head to see the man looking around shiftily at the entrance, pulling at the hat he had on his head. Greg nodded slowly and dropped his cigarette to the ground, stubbing it out after a moment. The man made his way into the station and after a moment Sherlock and Greg followed.

The man made his way down to the train tracks and then when he saw Sherlock he nodded towards him. “Are you the great Sherlock Holmes?” he asked.

Sherlock looked over at Greg, who gave him a confused look, and then nodded as he turned back to the man. “Yes,” he said slowly.

“Got a message for ya,” he said as the train pulled up. He swept his hat off his head and held it over his heart as he spoke and the train quickly loaded and unloaded passengers. “Life is so constructed that an event does not, cannot, will not, match the expectation.”

Sherlock stared for a moment as he ran the quote over in his head, trying to comprehend the meaning. Meanwhile Greg moved forward, trying to get through the crowd to get to the man. “Police!” he yelled, raising his badge. The man did a quick bow and then hopped through the train doorway just as it closed. Greg pounded on the door but the train pulled away. “Damn!”

“There will be no killing tonight,” Sherlock said, moving through the last of the crowd to get to Greg, placing a hand on his shoulder.

Greg glared at the train as it left the station for a moment before turning to Sherlock. “And just how do you know that?” he asked.

“The quote,” he said. “The specific quote. It’s from Char…” He paused at the name. “It’s from a work called Villette. It was published during my time. It is a piece I think the killer knows I am quite intimate with.”

Greg stared at him. “And just how would he know that?” he asked.

“Because the very first person he ever killed, he left the body at the church where the author of that work was to be buried the next day,” Sherlock said quietly. “The author was someone whom I was particulary close to, someone I cared deeply for. This was a direct message to me that the killer is done copying other people’s kills. From now on, things will be quite personal.”

Greg looked at him, worry in his eyes. “Sherlock, what’s going on?” he asked. “Something’s going on and you’re not telling me the whole story.”

“Yes,” he said quietly. “But for now, you’ll just have to trust me.”

Greg shut his eyes in the familiar “Dear God, grant me patience” pose he was used to seeing that mirrored his brother’s so exactly. “Fine,” he said after a moment. “But if you don’t mind, I’ll keep the detail here, for my own peace of mind.”

“Do as you please, but I have other places to be,” he said, turning around, his coat sweeping out behind him. Just because no innocent woman was getting murdered tonight did not mean everyone was going to be safe. He needed to make sure Molly was safe. This had suddenly turned even more personal than it had been before, and everyone needed to be on their guard.


	10. Chapter 10

He was glad for the invitation to Molly’s that had been extended during their lunch, that if he was able to come over for supper. Since the evening had been an utter disaster and he knew, now, that the killer was simply trying to taunt him and this was becoming more personal than any of the previous cases had and he now had to figure out why, at the very least he could do it inside, out of the rain. And, for the moment, he had a distraction, and it was a rather nice distraction. He saw when he had gotten inside her home that there was enough meat defrosted for four people, which implied that either it was intended for him to take some home or John and Mary had been expected to join them. To be honest, he was glad they hadn’t. He wanted time alone with Molly.

They chatted a bit while she prepared the meal but soon he felt the urge to look around her sitting room, glancing at things before making his way to her bookshelves. She had quite a few rare ones, it seemed. First editions, old leather bound books, very pretty volumes interspersed throughout… His eyes were drawn to a trio of books, though, and he gently pulled the first volume off the shelf. Molly came over and saw him looking at it, fingering the elaborately gilt-decorated spine with the raised bands and red and green morocco spine. These very same books sat in a vault at his brother’s home, a precious gift from the one woman he could say he had loved in the many years he’d been alive, the only woman before Molly. He generally avoided her name, her stories, the films and television programmes based on this, her most famous story. “Charlotte,” he said quietly, the first time he’d said her name in so long. He was surprised by that.

“You said you knew her,” Molly said.

He nodded slowly. “Quite well, actually.”

“You were very close, then?” she asked.

He turned the book over in his hands, looking at the cover of Jane Eyre. This particular set of books were published under her pseudonym, Currer Bell, but he, like everyone in the world, knew the truth of who really wrote them. “Back then, women would consider marrying men who were not their soul mates for a variety of reasons,” he said. “Protection, financial security, cover for discrete liaisons with members of the same sex, if their inclinations ran that way. It was theorized that two people could genuinely care for each other and be content, and if one person in the marriage did discover their soul mate the marriage could be annulled and the person would be free to marry their soul mate. I had only considered such a marriage once, and that was to Charlotte Brontë.”

Molly’s eyes widened. “That’s not…”

“In the history books?” he said with a small smile. “Well, Elizabeth Gaskell was not particularly fond of me, and as she wrote the first biography about Charlotte and made sure there was no mention of me, and as Mycroft made sure all evidence of our infatuation with each other had disappeared by the time she married Arthur Bell Nicholls…there was no need to bring me into it.”

“What was she like?” Molly asked as he set the book back on her shelf.

“To most of London, when she made her few visits from Haworth, she seemed very serious, very grave and stern. But she had a very kind smile and a very nice laugh, and she had a very wicked sense of humour. She had her moments of melancholy, but by the time I got to know her she had been trying to put it behind her, move forward with her life and find some semblance of happiness. And we had thought, for a time, perhaps we could find it with each other.”

“Did she ever find her soul mate?” Molly asked as they moved to her sofa.

He nodded. “Her husband was her soul mate, which means she had found him before she ever met me. I think, however, when she had met me she didn’t want to accept it. She didn’t want him to be her soul mate. But eventually she did accept him as such, and for a brief time she was happy with him.”

She studied him for a moment. “You knew, didn’t you?” she asked quietly.

“Well, there are people whose soul mates have died and they age as people normally do. I had hoped that had been the case, that her soul mate had died and she had met him or her briefly and that was that, and I could have time with her until she died. But then I investigated, as I am wont to do, and I realized her soul mate was Nicholls. History says Gaskell convinced Charlotte to marry him but that’s not the entire truth. I told her what I had discovered. I presented all the indisputable facts that Nicholls was indeed her soul mate and then I ended our attachment, and she accepted his proposal and married him shortly afterward, and then…”

“And then she died,” Molly finished. 

Sherlock nodded. “And then I stopped allowing myself to care for people.”

“You’ve held onto that hurt for over a hundred and fifty years,” Molly said, reaching over for his hand.

“It was easier not to care,” he said. “It was easier not to form attachments. John…John was an exception. He was my platonic soul mate. But John had also been there before I met Charlotte. I tried to push him away, but he wouldn’t budge. He persisted in remaining by my side like the stubborn git he is. And, I suppose I was lucky enough that John didn’t find his own soul mate until recently, because Lord knows what I would have done if I’d lost him, but I knew that the day could come and I dreaded it. So the fewer attachments I formed, the more I pushed people away, the safer I felt I would be.”

“But that’s such a lonely, awful way to live,” she said.

“It is,” he agreed with a nod. “But now that I’ve found you, eventually, it will end. And while most people would be sad about that, or angry, I just find relief. Or rather I will, if I can live the rest of my years with you.” He looked down at their hands. “I don’t want to spend any more time alone. I don’t want to be lonely anymore.”

She pulled her hand away and he looked up at her, confused, before she reached up to frame his face gently. “I promise you, Sherlock, you won’t have to,” she said softly before leaning in to kiss him softly. He moved his hands to her waist to pull her closer. He wanted her close, as close as he could hold her, because he was no longer going to be alone. This wonderful, vibrant, beautiful woman was going to be by his side, and he couldn’t be happier for that.


	11. Chapter 11

**April 3rd, 2008**

He had stayed at Molly’s for quite a while that evening. When dinner was done she had poured them each a glass of wine and they’d moved to the sofa and talked for quite a while. There had been some more kissing as well, and he had to admit he had enjoyed that portion of the evening quite a bit. He had stayed until John and Mary arrived back from their date. John had already intended to stay there for the evening, but he definitely thought it was a good idea when Sherlock told him about what had happened at the Blackfriars Station earlier that evening. After one last kiss goodnight to Molly, Sherlock made his way back to Baker Street alone.

He let himself inside and made his way to the sitting room. It had been rather rare to have the flat to himself, to be honest; over the years John had been there most of the time, or the various housekeepers, or there had been clients. If he had not found Molly, this would have been what he would have had to get used to, he realized. This feeling of quiet and emptiness. Of aloneness.

He’d have gone mad so quickly.

He went to his violin case and picked up his violin and bow. He needed to think, and, at least while he was alone, he could play without worrying if it was going to distract anyone, as at the moment he did not have a live-in housekeeper. He tucked the violin under his chin and then began to play. He was not playing anything in particular, just doing what came to mind as he thought about the case.

It had suddenly become personal. The fact that the Anniversary Killer had purposefully skipped an anniversary and then had a stranger deliver a taunting message meant that something had changed. Something had happened and now there was a new game afoot. The only thing that had changed, though, was that he had discovered his soul mate. But they had not been public about it. There was no way the killer could have known.

His playing became slightly more frenzied for a few moments as he calculated every possible means that the killer could have figured it out, considering every outlandish possibility. After all, once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. Finally, though, he realized he was working himself into nothing more than a headache. He began to purposefully play more soothing music to lull himself into a calmer state, and once he felt himself feeling more relaxed he ceased playing and then put away his violin and began to get ready for bed.

He shut off the light on his nightstand and attempted to go to sleep, but his sleep was restless. It was not hard to hear the pinging of small stones on his bedroom window what seemed to be many hours later. He made his way over and opened it, looking out at the street below and seeing a member of his homeless network there.”Yes?” he called down.

“You told us to be on the lookout for something fishy at Kensal Green Cemetery, yeah?” the man, a chap named Wiggins, said. “Near the graves marked Holmes?”

Sherlock perked up slightly. He knew there were a group of people in his homeless network who had a fondness for graveyards and his brother had not wanted people desecrating their parent’s grave, so he had some of them keep an eye out on their parents’ grave for monetary payment and foodstuffs. He hadn’t thought it would pay off. “What happened?” he asked.

“Someone was fiddling with them,” Wiggins said.”Not desecrating them, though. They might have left something. No one’s touched them or been by them since, but Kamala’s making sure no one messes with the graves, just in case.”

Sherlock nodded. “Tell the others there will be a bonus this week, in money and foodstuffs. And for you as well.”

Wiggins nodded and then made his way down the street, blending into the early morning fog. Sherlock pulled away from the window and then went to go get ready to check out the graves when his mobile rang. He went to his nightstand and saw it was John. He picked up and John spoke immediately. “Someone just tried to break in here. I scared them off but Molly and Mary are a bit spooked.”

“Wonderful,” Sherlock said. “Someone left something at my parents’ graves as well.”

“You reckon they know about Molly?” John asked.

“I do indeed,” Sherlock said. “Is she alright?”

“She’s a bit shaken, but more angry than scared,” he said. “She’d like you here, though.”

“Let me get dressed and I’ll be over shortly,” he replied. “I’d rather have her close at the moment.”

“I’ll let her know, then,” John said.

Sherlock hung up and quickly got dressed, and then went outside and hailed the first cab he could to go to Molly and Mary’s home. He asked the driver to wait when he arrived and strode up to the door, knocking when he got there. John answered it, but the minute he stepped inside, before he could do much more than exchange pleasantries, he was embraced by Molly. He held her tightly, glad that she was all right. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said, her voice muffled because her face was buried in his coat.

“I know,” he said. He held her tightly for a few minutes. “I need to go to my parents’ grave. Just before John called, I was told someone paid it a visit. I need to see if there was anything left. Will you come with me?”

Molly nodded. “Let me get dressed,” she said, pulling away with some reluctance.

Sherlock let her go and she turned away, heading towards her bedroom.

Sherlock turned to John. “Keep an eye on Mary,” he said. “She could be a potential target or lure as well.”

John nodded. “I’ll try my best,” he said. John looked back at Molly’s retreating figure. “This has turned into a fine mess, hasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Sherlock said, turning his gaze in that direction as well. “Hopefully we’ll figure it out sooner rather than later.” _Because now I have so much more to lose,_ he added silently in his head.


	12. Chapter 12

They made their way into the cemetery, staying close. He’d have much rather done this under the cover of night, knowing it would have made it harder for the killer to keep track of them, if he was indeed keeping track, but he had to guess that he already knew about Molly if the attempted break-in at Molly’s was connected to all this. He kept Molly close, though. He knew the way to his parent’s graves like the back of his hand, and he strode to them with a singular sense of purpose, only slowing when it was obvious when Molly was having trouble keeping up.

His parents had died within weeks of each other. His mother had died first, of influenza, and his father had died peacefully in his sleep of a heart attack, though the doctor who had declared him dead said he had likely died of a broken heart from being deprived of his dear Violet. He thought about it, on occasion, what his parents would have thought of Greg. He doubted they would have batted an eye at the fact that his brother’s soul mate was another male; his family had always been rather ahead of the times. He was sure Greg would have been warmly welcomed into the family, adored by his mother, and enjoyed by his father. And now...now he wondered what they would have thought of Molly. He hated that they would never get the chance to know her, never get the chance to see him be happy again, the way he had been with Charlotte.

Or, perhaps, even happier.

He and Molly made it to his parent’s grave site remarkably quickly, all things considered. Their grave had been the typically showy affair the moderately wealthy could have in those times: an open gate behind their shared tombstone, an open book at the front of it, draped urns on either side. There were twin plots open on either side for him and Mycroft and their partners, for their parents had had great hope their sons would find their soul mates eventually. Mycroft complained about the price of upkeep of the plots but he wouldn’t part with them, and begrudgingly, deep down, he was glad for that.

“I heard that graves like this have symbolism,” Molly said, watching Sherlock inspect the graves.

He nodded. “They do. The open gates in the back represent the passage into Heaven, the leaving of the land of the living for the great beyond. Both my parents took great comfort in the idea of an afterlife. The open book represents their shared love of literature. It’s also, more obliquely, a reference to the book of life. Symbolically it represents the human heart being open to God, as well as the recorded deeds of a person’s life.” He moved around the grave a bit. “The urns were quite common in Victorian times. It’s supposed to represent the separation between the living and the dead, and a protective shroud for the soul, and some other hogwash. I think that the person selling them to Mycroft had a surplus and just needed to get rid of some. Two urns for the price of one. My brother couldn’t beat a deal like that. Of course, he probably ratcheted up the price, so…”

“Do all the statues have meanings?” she asked, looking around and rubbing her arms slightly from the morning chill.

“Yes,” he said, standing up. “Lambs were usually at graves of children, representing innocence or Jesus, since he was supposedly the Lamb of God. Tree stumps and doves meant a life cut off short, though doves were usually reserved for young women who died since they represented peace and purity. Inverted torches were meant to show the soul still burning in the afterlife.” He made his way around the headstone and then paused, lifting something up. “Damn him.”

“What?” Molly asked, moving closer.

He held up a small bundle of leaves and a dark crimson rosebud, snapped in half, tied together with a black ribbon, before gesturing to the leaves engraved on the bottom of the tombstone of his parents. “These are oak leaves. Oak leaves symbolize a long life. A bundle of wheat can mean the same thing, but my parents loved trees so we had oak leaves engraved. Anyway, it means that when a person died, they were harvested by the reaper when it was the appropriate time. They’d lived a full and meaningful life. But the rose is different. The bloom of the rose represents the age of a lady when she died. If it’s in bloom it means she’s lived some of her life, but it’s probably still too soon. But if it’s a rosebud like this…then it means she died too soon.” He looked over at her. “It means the killer knows about you. About us. They know you’re my soul mate and they plan to make sure neither of us survives the rest of this encounter.”

She looked scared for a moment and then a look of determination crossed her face. “I’m not going to let some centuries old psychopath take away _my_ soul mate when I just found him or threaten _my_ life just because he’s got a vendetta. I’m going to put him in jail or put him in the ground.” She looked at the bundle in his hands and then nodded to the ground. “Stop manhandling that and call your brother-in-law. Let’s see what we can do with getting Scotland Yard involved in this a bit more.”

Sherlock blinked as he looked at her, and then a slow grin crossed his face. Oh, it was very clear that the two of them were _definitely_ meant for each other, he realized. He set the bundle down and got his mobile out, dialing up Greg’s number. It rang a few times and Sherlock began speaking as soon as someone picked up. “I need you to get to my parent’s grave,” he said. “Our mutual enemy has left a rather personal message for Molly and me.”

“It’s six o’clock in the morning,” Greg said, stifling a yawn. “Don’t you ever sleep in?”

“Not when a killer is on the loose playing head games,” he said. “He left a bundle at the grave mimicking cemetery symbolism. It’s a direct threat to my soul mate and I am not pleased about that.”

“Soul…mate?” Greg said slowly.

Sherlock paused. “I didn’t mention that tidbit earlier?” he said, watching Molly raise an eyebrow.

“Can’t say that you did,” Greg said. “At least not to _me_. So…who is she? He?”

“ _She_ is the specialist registrar at Barts, Molly Hooper,” Sherlock said.

“Get out!” Greg said, and Sherlock could tell he was pleased with the news. He could also tell his brother was not quite as pleased because he could hear Mycroft grumbling in the background. “You two…she’s your…really? That’s great!”

“Well, it will be so long as we catch this killer before he decides to kill either of us first,” Sherlock said. “So please. Disentangle yourself from my brother and come offer your assistance.” He paused for a moment. “And also, _don’t_ make too big a fuss about this around Mycroft.”

“Oh, no,” Greg said. “This is a big deal. You get a huge fuss, Sherlock. Deal with it. I’ll be there in about forty, okay?”

Sherlock sighed. “Fine,” he said. He hung up his mobile and looked at Molly, who was barely containing her amusement. “What?”

“I just have the feeling it’s going to be awfully fun meeting your brother, that’s all,” she said with a smile.

“You say that _now_ ,” he said. “You may eat your words later.”

“Oh, I doubt it,” she said. “So, how long do we need to wait?”

“About forty minutes,” he said.

“Then I suggest we find a nearby coffee shop and get coffee because it’s going to be a long day,” she said, going over to him and taking his hand. She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Come on. I’ll even make it my treat. I get the feeling your brother-in-law is going to give you all sorts of grief today.”

He threaded his fingers through hers as he nodded. Even if Greg was a colossal pain in the arse today, he had the feeling he would be just fine, so long as Molly was by his side…at least as long as nothing went horribly wrong today.


	13. Chapter 13

Greg had arrived at the scene not in a patrol car but in one of his brother’s private cars, and told Sherlock that he would take care of things, and that he and Molly were to get into the car that he had just exited from and go back to his home. This did not bode well, Sherlock had thought. Being summoned by his brother meant that Greg had told Mycroft that Molly was his soul mate, and now Molly was to be interrogated. He did not want to have a woman he cared for go through this again. He knew Molly could bear this better than Charlotte, but still.

Greg talked to Molly in private for a few moments before she joined him in the car. She grasped his hand but said nothing, instead resting her head on his shoulder and staying close to him. It did not take long for them to reach Mycroft’s home on the outskirts of London. Their parents had had land back in the time when the town of London had been less incorporated, and they had built a very nice home there. Mycroft had had it fortified and the security strengthened so that it resembled a fortress these days, but it was still a very nice property, worth quite a tidy sum. He knew if Mycroft and Greg never adopted children, and that was something he highly doubted they would ever do, the property would fall to him when they both were gone. He had thought it would end with him but now, with Molly in his life, there was the possibility it would stay in the family for some time in the future.

They got out of the sedan and were taken by Mycroft’s assistant to his study. He was there, dressed in an impeccable three piece suit, seated behind his desk, his arms upon it and his fingers laced together. “So you are my brother’s soul mate,” he said, his gaze resting on Molly.

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “Come off it, Mycroft. Greg knows her and already said he likes her. Don’t bother trying to intimidate her. She’s not a stain to the family name and you know it.”

Mycroft glared at his brother. He had aged in quite the regal manner, it seemed, though the comforts of being well loved had allowed him a bit of indulgence. He was no longer as trim and fit as he was in the stasis of youth. Their father had been much the same, he remembered, so he supposed he had that to look forward to when he finally began to show his age. Still, if he was happy, he supposed it was worth it. His glare was pulled away by the sound of Molly stifling a giggle. He turned to her, raising an eyebrow. “You’re amused?” he asked her.

“Oh, it’s just that this is exactly how Greg said it was going to go,” she said, moving to the chair in front of Mycroft’s desk and sitting down. “He said you’d try and intimidate me and Sherlock would get annoyed and then the two of you would get into a glaring contest. I owe him a tenner now. I’d rather hoped he was wrong but wow, he really does know you two well.”

“As he’s been my husband since 1991 I would assume so,” Mycroft said, appearing to relax slightly. He removed his arms from his desk and then leaned back in his seat and looked at her. “The fact my soul mate is another male isn’t off-putting?”

She shook her head. “My mum is an Anomaly,” she said. “She had two soul mates. My dad was her first, and she aged very slowly while they were together, not as fast as he did. When he died she stopped aging. Then she met her second soul mate in…” She thought for a moment. “1994, I think. Maybe 1995. Anyway, she met Laura and then she started aging again. Laura’s great for her. I adore my stepmum to pieces.”

Mycroft grinned slightly at that. “So for you, same sex relationships are nothing out of the ordinary.”

She shook her head. “Not at all. My sister’s in one, too, in fact. She and her wife just celebrated their ten year anniversary on New Year’s Day.” She gave Mycroft a grin. “When I tell her, my mum’s going to be ecstatic. Not that she would have minded if my soul mate had been a woman as well, mind you, but I think she missed seeing men in the family tree.”

Mycroft chuckled at that, which surprised Sherlock. “There is no shortage of that in the Holmes or Holmes-Lestrade families, I assure you.”

“Good,” she said with a nod. “So I’m assuming the interrogation’s all over? Unless breakfast’s going to count as an interrogation as well. I’d rather it didn’t.”

Mycroft tilted his head. “And what made you assume this was an interrogation?”

“Your husband warned me it was,” she said.

Mycroft sighed. “My husband takes away all my fun sometimes,” he said.

Molly leaned forward. “Well, if you’d really like, we can pretend you don’t have a file on every tidbit of my life that you’ve probably been over at least twice now and you can ask me all the questions you like,” she said. “We’ll just make sure it stays in ‘friendly chat’ territory and firmly out of ‘interrogation’ territory,’ all right?”

Mycroft eyed Molly, looking her up and down, and then turned to Sherlock. “You may go.”

“What?” he said, giving his brother a confused look.

“Miss Hooper and I are going to have an extended friendly chat. Your presence in the room is no longer required. You may go,” he said, making a shooing motion with his hands.

Sherlock stared at his brother with wide eyes and an open mouth for a moment before turning to Molly. She nodded, and then he closed his mouth and shook his head. “Unbelieveable. I was _summoned_ and now I’m being _dismissed_ after being summarily _ignored_ ,” he muttered, turning around from his position behind the chairs and leaving Mycroft’s study. 

He made his way to the kitchen to get himself some breakfast, as all he and Molly had managed to get were a cup of coffee each. Mycroft’s cook was there and she made him eggs, toast, beans, bangers and mash and back bacon, which he ate at the table in the kitchen. He was nearly done when Molly came in. “No fair that you got to eat,” she said, smile on her face.

“Greta will make you something if you ask,” he said, using the last of his toast to sop up the egg yolks on his plate. She nodded and said what she could make, and Molly settled on French toast before sitting down and joining Sherlock. “Have a nice chat with my brother?”

She nodded. “He’s quite different than you,” she said.

“We’re polar opposites,” he said before taking a bite of his toast.

“Well, I wouldn’t go that far,” she said. “But he is an interesting man. I think I like you better, though. But I can see why Greg adores him. They’re well suited for each other.”

Sherlock nodded. “I see. And what about us?”

“What about us?” she asked.

“Are _we_ well suited for each other?”

“Yes, I think so,” she said. “You’ve gone to great lengths to show you’re not always the egotistical arse that I was inclined to think you are.”

“Not always?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Professionally, you can be,” she said with a grin. “But there you rather have a reason to be. But when it’s just us, you’re rather nice. Charming. And…sweet.” He set his hand down on the table and she reached over to grasp it. “I like to think I see glimpses of the man you were all those years ago, when you were with her, before you shut yourself off from the world.”

“I’m trying,” he said, opening his hand so he could thread his fingers through hers. “You deserve that much.”

“And I appreciate that,” she said with a smile. He raised her hand to his lips and kissed her fingers. “You know, men don’t usually do that.”

“Byproduct of a bygone era,” he said.

“Well,” she said, leaning in with a grin. “I like it.”

“I’ll have to remember that,” he said with an answering grin back. He was going to say more when his mobile rang, and he unlaced their fingers and pulled his mobile out of his pocket. “It’s Greg.”

“Answer it,” she said.

He nodded and then answered the call. “Yes?”

“Our Anniversary Killer did strike last night,” he said, his tone weary. “Only it wasn’t that anniversary he celebrated.”

“Oh?” Sherlock said.

“Just got a call from the police in Haworth. Apparently there’s a body at the Church of St Michael and All Angels. Dressed in a black Victorian mourning gown.”

Sherlock shut his eyes. “And today is the third of April,” he said quietly. “The day before Charlotte Brontë was buried at the church.”

“Yeah,” Greg said. “They want you to come have a look.”

“I’ll be there as soon as I can,” he said. He hung up and turned to Molly. “Stay here,” he said. “Don’t leave the grounds, for any reason. You’re safe here.”

“Sherlock, what’s going on?” she asked.

“It all comes back to Charlotte,” he said. “All of this. The killings, the anniversaries…all of it.” He stood up, then moved around the table and stood in front of her. “Promise me you will stay here, please.”

“All right, Sherlock. I promise.” He framed her face in his hands and kissed her softly. They should have been spending more time getting to know each other, learning the small details about each other that would make their love for each other bloom and blossom and last until the end of their days, not worrying about someone trying to cut things tragically short, not worrying about trying to stay alive. She kissed him back as she covered his hands with hers, grasping them tightly. “Be safe,” she said when they pulled apart to breathe.

“I will,” he said, and with that he turned to leave. He was sure Greg had already sent a patrol car for him or perhaps one of Mycroft’s personal cars. All he knew was that after over a hundred and fifty years, he was going back to Haworth, and this time he was going to make sure that the killer was caught…one way or another.


	14. Chapter 14

Greg had arranged for one of Mycroft’s cars to take him to the church he had not been to in so long. He wondered if it would look the same as it had a hundred and fifty years ago. He doubted it would; for one, there would be more graves. Even though there were people constantly being born and then effectively not aging once they hit eighteen, there were still people dying as well, and that meant graves being needed all over the world. Even in a hundred and fifty years, a cemetery would need to expand as people died.

He should have had John come. Hell, he probably should have insisted Molly come with him. She’d be safer if she was by his side. And he wasn’t sure he could do this alone. This was more than just the case. This was his past, his memories. This was a killer using the memory of the woman he had loved so long ago to taunt him. And even now, even after all this time, it was affecting him.

Fine. So he had to be the cold, heartless, logical robot he had turned himself into after Charlotte’s death again. He had to look at this logically and focus on why it was all being done now, why it was being done this way.

It was obvious the killer knew he’d found his soul mate; the evidence left at his parents graves showed that. There was no reason to include the rose if he did not know about Molly. But how had he found out? Once soul mates met, the attractions formed quickly; he and Molly had met three days ago and had only been out in public once prior to this morning, at Pret A Manger. He shut his eyes and thought back to that, relaying the entire afternoon in his mind. And then it hit him: when John and Greg had gone to get their meals. Molly had reached across for his hand, to give him assurance. He had lifted their hands up and brushed his lips against her knuckles. As Molly had pointed out, that was not a common gesture in this era.

But it was something someone from his time would recognize.

He had surveyed the diners in the restaurant when he first walked in, giving them each a quick but thorough glance. The benefits of having a mind palace and a photographic memory was that he never forgot a face.

The downside of having a photographic memory was that he had two hundred years of faces to remember.

He studied each person in the restaurant, trying to see if anyone looked familiar for any reason at all. And then it hit him like a bolt out of the blue. The man was older now, clean shaven, but give him a cane, put a capelet on him…

_He’d never thought the chaperone would leave. Not that they really needed one; she was past the proper marrying age, after all. Her prospects were dim. But Charlotte was a lady of reputation, since it was well known that she’d written Jane Eyre and Shirley. His intentions were quite proper, of course, though he wouldn’t mind a chaste kiss or two. He did adore her, his Charlotte, and he was fairly sure she adored him. They weren’t soul mates, but perhaps, until they could find them…perhaps, if they didn’t think to look…they could be happy together for a time. If her father would allow it._

_He’d handed her a rose, as they were standing by the Crystal Fountain. She had blushed, a slight tingeing of red on her cheeks. She’d looked quickly around, and they both saw that Watson was still occupying the chaperone’s attention, being his natural charming self. She had leaned in to press her lips to his cheek when she gasped. She pulled back quickly, all traces of colour from her face gone, leaving her pale as a sheet, and she had swooned in his arms. He’d turned and seen a man with a walking stick…no, a cane. He got a good look at his face: high forehead, wide nose, somewhat bushy eyebrows, stern face and a look of irate anger on his face, of abject hatred._

_This man hated her, or hated him, and he had no idea why._

_And then he was off, dashing into the crowds._

Charlotte had seemed to know the man but she wouldn’t say who he was, only that he was a man from her past. It wasn’t until later that he pieced together, thanks to letters published in 1913 by The Times and portraits he had seen in later years, that it had most likely been Constantin Georges Romain Héger, a former professor of hers, a married man she had an attachment towards, shortly before she had met him. As far as he had understood, it had not been mutual. Perhaps he had been wrong.

But… Héger was supposed to have died around the turn of the century.

So if Héger was the man he had seen in the Crystal Palace in 1851 as well as the man he had seen in the restaurant a few days ago, how was that possible?

He continued to ponder that question for the duration of his trip to Haworth. When he got to the Church of St Michael and All Angels he got out and went looking for the chief inspector on the case, hoping against hope that the body was nowhere near the Brontë family vault. Fortunately, his luck held out and it was in the same spot the body had been before, in 1855. He examined the body closely, as it had been left for him to study, and spotted the three dot mark behind the victim’s left ear. Hanging his head, he stood up and informed the inspector that this case was an anniversary killing of the killer’s very first victim from a hundred and fifty-three years prior, and there really wasn’t much he could do to help, as it wasn’t a copycat killing but the same killer.

He made to leave the church and then paused. He was close. He knew there were probably hundreds or thousands of people who went by there to pay their respects, but today the whole cemetery was cordoned off and so it would be just him. He could have privacy. It took some time, but eventually he found his way to the Brontë family vault. And once there, before he could begin to pay his respects, he saw flowers. A bouquet of pink & red carnations, daffodils, blue hyacinths, an orange lily and a dark crimson rosebud broken at the stem with a card attached. He remembered well the lessons in the language of the flowers and was confused. Why include an orange lily for hatred when the rest of the bouquet seemed to be for mourning a lost love? 

He pulled out a pair of latex gloves from his coat pocket and looked at the note. _If life be a war, it seemed my destiny to conduct it single-handed,_ it began. _Though the only road to freedom lie through the gates of death, those gates must be passed; for freedom is indispensable._ His blood ran cold at the quotes, which he recognized from being from two of Charlotte’s books, the first from  Villette and the second from  The Professor. Both of which, he realized, had been based on her time spent in Brussels with Héger. This was all a ruse, he realized. But _why_? 

He set the card down and pulled out his mobile. He had put it on silent while speaking to the inspector and studying the body, and now saw that he had voicemails. He checked and saw his brother and Greg had both tried calling him. This did not bode well, he realized as he dialed his brother without bothering to check them. “Mycroft,” he said, speaking the moment he answered. “Where’s Molly?”

“She got a call from her roommate Mary,” he said in the tone where he was trying to prepare him for bad news. He knew that tone. He hated that tone. “She left my estate and went to her flat. Mary was out cold. We don’t know where she is now.”

Sherlock felt his insides turn to ice. “Were there any clues left?” he asked quietly.

“None,” Mycroft said. “Sherlock—”

“I’ll find her,” he said, hanging up. Sherlock picked up the card again, studying it more closely. There was a picture of a fountain on the card. Then he looked at the flowers. The only flower in the arrangement that was out of place, aside from the lily, was the rose. Deep crimson meant mourning. If the flowers were left to celebrate Héger’s love for Charlotte then the rose must have meant Molly, as it was the same color and type left at his parent’s grave. The picture on the card and the rose meant that it _had_ been Héger who had been spying on him and Charlotte all those years ago, and Sherlock knew exactly where he wanted to meet.

He just hoped Molly was safe. That was all he cared about right now.


	15. Chapter 15

He had not gone to this section of Hyde Park in well over a hundred years. He had avoided it since the end of the Great Exhibition of 1851, when the Crystal Palace had been displayed for the world to see. He had seen Charlotte many times there, going out amongst the different exhibits. There had been wondrous things there, such as the Koh-i-Noor diamond and Sevres porcelain, and things that, now, would seem so commonplace, such as music organs and fire engines and the massive hydraulic press. It had originally been £3 for gentlemen, £2 for ladies, and he could well afford that, so they went daily while she was in town. Even now, as he stood gazing at the spot, he could see the glass and iron building, see the magnificent Crystal Fountain, hear the chatter and laughter of the masses come to see the grandness of the world in the closeness of home. He could even remember Queen Victoria opening the Great Exhibition herself. And he could remember Charlotte’s smile, her eagerness, her curiosity as vividly as if it were yesterday.

He’d looked forward to those days.

It all came back to her, it seemed. All of this, this game that was being played. The serial killings with the three note signature had started the day before her burial. Not the anniversary ones; those had only come when he’d begun to make a name for himself, and that had only happened when he had driven himself to push everyone away because alone was better, alone was safer. Alone kept his heart safe and he wouldn’t lose it in foolishness like he had done to Charlotte. Alone would keep him from feeling the pain he felt to know she was no longer among them because she had found her soul mate, found love and briefly, too damn briefly, succumbed to it and lost her life to it. Alone meant he could focus on cold hard logic with all of his brain and leave his heart out of things. 

Alone meant he didn’t have to feel.

And alone had worked perfectly fine until Molly.

And now the damned Anniversary Killer had her in his clutches and if anything happened to her, if he lost her…

He shook his head. He had to focus. John was intelligent enough to decipher his message about going to where he had chased after the man with the cane in 1851 and pass word along to his brother and Greg by now. Reinforcements should be on the way, provided his adversary didn’t do anything incredibly foolish such as take him to another location. But even then, he hoped, he was prepared. He had the tracking device he knew his brother had installed on his mobile turned on and his mobile on silent and hidden in the lining of his suit jacket. For once he was thankful for modern technology. He just prayed his adversary was not craftier than him.

“Brings back memories?” Sherlock heard a male voice call out.

“Yes,” Sherlock said, turning to face the direction the voice was coming from. He saw no one in the shadows, however. He had to be very careful. He was playing by someone else’s rules, and he needed to be on his guard.

“Those…they were better days,” Héger said. Sherlock listened carefully, studying it. There was a faint trace of an accent, though the years had done its best to wear it away. It sounded faintly Belgian. The timbre of voice sounded old but not frail. “This modern world, this is not a place where men such as we belong.”

“I’ve felt I’ve done quite well for myself in modern times,” Sherlock said, turning. It sounded as if Héger was moving, circling him. Circling his prey, he thought to himself. Because that was what he was now: prey. He waited a moment but his adversary did not speak. “Where is Molly?”

“She is safe,” Héger said. “I did not think it was fair for you to not watch me snuff out her life, for you to not see for yourself all that you could have had, gone in an instant.”

“Let her go,” Sherlock said, a tremor of panic edging into his voice. “She’s done nothing wrong. She has no reason to be pulled into this.”

“You took something of mine, long ago,” he said. “You took the light of my life, you and him. You took her and then she was gone, so young. Just in the prime of her life.”

“Charlotte,” Sherlock said quietly.

“Yes,” Héger said. “You stole her from me, you and Nichols. I already took my revenge upon him and now…now I will take my revenge upon you.”

“What do you mean?” Sherlock asked sharply, but then he felt a hand clamp over his mouth and a sickly sweet smell envelop his senses. Damn him. Héger had disoriented his senses, gotten him confused, and crept up behind him wordlessly. He struggled, but the chloroform was too much, and soon he was giving in to sweet oblivion, hoping and praying to a God he didn’t believe in that there was still a chance he could save Molly and get the two of them out of this situation alive.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The dress that I based Molly’s outfit on looks like the first dress found on [this page](http://www.fashionfemale.net/black-victorian-dresses-for-mourning-moment-costume-ideas.html).

He came to and the first thing he realized was he was tied to a chair at one end of a table where Molly, dressed in an elegant Victorian mourning dress, was at the other. 

The second was that his captor had done a quite shoddy job searching him.

The third was that his captor was indeed, he realized, quite familiar.

“Constantin Georges Romain Héger,” Sherlock said quietly. “You’re supposed to be dead.”

“Supposed to be,” Héger said, giving him a grim smile. “Surprisingly, I am not.” He moved to Molly’s end of the table and ran a finger along the bare skin on Molly’s shoulder, between the ribbon around Molly’s neck and the ruffled sleeves slightly off the shoulder. He recognized the style as something women of Molly’s apparent age would wear, young widows mourning a husband. The same type of gown the women who were killed when Héger first started killing wore. _Damn him,_ he thought to himself. “I married my first wife, but did not age. Nor did I age when I married Claire. It was not until I met Charlotte…then I began to age.”

“But Charlotte was not meant to be your soul mate,” Sherlock said, trying to loosen the bonds that held him to the chair. He was thankful he’d palmed the slim blade before he’d left Baker Street and hidden it up his shirtsleeve. He had to get free to save Molly. “She was meant to be Arthur’s.”

Héger sneered at Sherlock. “I thought for sure she was yours. The way she looked at you…I saw the two of you once, at Hyde Park. It was rare I could leave the school and my wife and my children but I had to see her. I yearned to see her. And so I timed a visit to London when I knew she would have left Haworth but she was spending time with _you_ ,” he spat out. “She was smiling. You gave her a rose and she looked happy. I hated you more in that moment than I hated any man alive.”

Realization dawned on Sherlock then. “You’re an Anomaly,” he said. 

“Yes,” Héger said bitterly. “In my case, a person whose soul mate does not bond with them. I aged for a time but did not die, so I faked my death and then moved to the shadows.”

“Was your wife not the same?” Molly asked groggily from where she was tied up at the other end of the table. Sherlock had not realized she was awake yet but he was glad for it. She was alive. This was good.

“My wife’s soul mate had perished before she met me, I found out later,” he said. “She was fond of me, so she settled for her own protection. I was second best.” He moved closer to Sherlock. “Nicholls was nothing but you…you stole her heart. You stole her away from me and you deserve to be punished for that. You stole Charlotte away from me so I shall steal your love from you.”

“Let her go,” Sherlock said. He was almost loose, he could tell. Just a few minutes more. “Your quarrel is with me. It’s you and I that have history. She has a life ahead of her. If you want to hurt her more, let her live her life alone, without me.”

“Sherlock…” Molly said, pain evident in her voice. “Please, no.”

“She’s met me. She’ll age and grow old. Let her live a long life without me but dear God, let her live,” he said. “If you are still any ounce of the man that Charlotte loved…she would have preferred that.” Any moment now…

Héger considered it. “She would have, wouldn’t she?” he said.

“Yes,” Sherlock said with a nod.

Héger nodded, then turned and went to Molly. “Very well. I will let her live.”

And in that moment he was free. He severed the last of the rope on one hand and while Héger was occupied with Molly he quickly and quietly untied his other wrist. Héger had not bothered tying his midsection or his ankles, which was rather sloppy of him, and he quietly stood from the chair and went to subdue his foe. He took the length of rope he hadn’t cut with him, but Héger turned and threw a punch before he could get close enough, and then they were engaged in fisticuffs. They’d both had years of experience in fighting, in defending themselves, but then Sherlock was on his back and Héger got the rope. He wrapped it around Sherlock’s neck and began to strangle him. Sherlock could feel the life ebbing out of him, and with one last thrust jabbed the slim blade forward, hoping it hit its mark.

Slowly he felt Héger’s grip slacken and he could breathe again, but only for a moment before the man toppled on top of Sherlock. Sherlock gasped for breath for a moment before he shoved the man off of him and unwrapped the rope from his neck. He could see he’d managed to stab Héger in the chest, right between the ribs and directly in the heart. He’d been damned lucky. He stood and made his way to Molly. “Are you all right?” he asked, beginning to undo the bonds at her wrists.

She nodded, and he could see she was shaking slightly. Once he got her arms free she threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck. “He could have killed you,” she said, burying her face in the crook of his neck.

He held her close, his fingers digging into the silk of the mourning gown Héger had put Molly in, his body sinking into the black skirt. He wanted to get her out of it and back into the bright and chipper modern clothes he had grown fond of seeing her in. “I wasn’t about to let him,” he said soothingly, smoothing her hair back.

“Good. I’m not ready to lose you yet,” she said, pulling away from him. She reached up and framed his face, running her thumbs over his cheekbones. “I do love you, Sherlock. I do. I mean, I know I started off not liking you in the least, but—”

He cut her off with a kiss as the sound of his brother and brother-in law and John and others began to echo in the air. They’d been found, so it seemed, but the problem was taken care of and the killer was dispatched to the netherworld and all he cared about at the moment was losing himself in Molly’s embrace and to her kisses and there was not a damned thing in the world more important than that right now.


	17. Chapter 17

It was hours later when everyone was gathered at Baker Street. Both Sherlock and Molly had been checked out by paramedics and it had been decided neither needed to be taken to A & E, so Molly had called Mary to bring her a change of clothing and a pair of pyjamas and a dressing gown as well. Sherlock hadn’t been quite sure what to make of that, but then Molly had said they were going to Baker Street and she was going to change into the pyjamas and dressing gown and eventually she was going to sleep in his arms in his bed and if anyone had any objections they could sod off.

That wasn’t how things were done in his time but as he had no real objections to that plan he was going to, as the term went, roll with them.

And so now he and Molly were on the sofa. He’d gone ahead and changed into his own pyjamas and dressing gown, and Molly was curled up against him with his arm around her shoulder. Mary was sitting in John’s chair with John perched on the arm, her leaning forward, eager to hear the story. Greg was in the opposite chair and his brother was pacing behind his husband, something that was rather distracting. Finally he’d had enough. “Mycroft, stand still or sit down,” Sherlock said exasperatedly.

Mycroft stopped, then planted both hands on the back of the chair Greg was sitting in. Greg reached up and placed a hand over his husbands, trying to give him some reassurance, it seemed. “My apologies,” Mycroft said quietly.

“So how did you know it had to be this Héger fellow?” Mary asked.

“He’d been keeping a close eye on me, but once he learned of Molly’s existence and the fact she was my soul mate he _wanted_ me to know,” Sherlock said, absently tightening his hold on her. She responded by doing the same around his waist and snuggling in more. “I had my doubts. I had thought, perhaps, that someone wanted me to believe that; after all, Héger was supposed to have died in 1896. But the clues he left at the church, the oblique mentions of passages from  The Professor and Vilette, were more pointed towards Héger, as her time spent with him was the inspiration, and then it was the fact that I was told to go to that specific part of Hyde Park that was the final bit that convinced me.”

“But how?” Greg asked.

John’s eyes widened. “The man with the cane,” he said.

Sherlock nodded. “Exactly.”

“I’m lost,” Greg said.

“The original Crystal Palace was only open for six months,” John said. He shut his eyes for a moment. “Her Majesty opened it...God, I _know_ this, I was there…”

“The first of May, 1851,” Mycroft supplied. “It closed the eleventh of October before Laing, Schuster and the others formed that holding company and moved it to the location on top of Sydenham Hill.”

“Getting forgetful in your old age?” Mary teased.

“You were born in 1899 so you aren’t _that_ much younger,” he said back.

“Watch it, you,” she said, though she had a grin on her face.

“Off topic,” Sherlock said, getting slightly annoyed .

“Sorry,” John said. “Anyway, Charlotte didn’t leave her father’s home at Haworth much, since he was ill. And when she was in London, loads of people wanted her time. So when she could, she’d arrange to visit the Great Exhibition with a group of people, but in the end, it would always be her and Sherlock and a chaperone with them. One day I joined them, chatting up the chaperone to give them a bit of time to themselves. They were by the Crystal Fountain, and Charlotte was happy one moment and swooning the next. Sherlock tended to her but not before he told me to chase after a man with a cane who’d run off to the retiring rooms.”

Sherlock saw the confused look on Molly’s face. “They were the first public toilets,” he said. “Originally they were only for the men but eventually they catered to women. It was from those public toilets that the euphemism ‘spending a penny’ came about, because it cost a penny to use them.”

“Interesting,” she said. She turned to John. “And you lost him there?”

“Around those parts,” John said with a nod. “All I found was the cane, a capelet and a fake mustache.”

Sherlock sat up slightly. “Later Charlotte said it was as though it was a scene from a penny dreadful, as though she had seen a spectre, a man she had known before, but she said no more on that. But when I got the message tonight I had my suspicions that, perhaps, there was something I had missed. Something I had overlooked all these years. Then I remembered all the people I had seen in the Pret A Manger and it all came at once. The men were the same, just different ages, and then I realized they were Héger.”

“I can fill in some more of this story,” Greg said, removing his hand from Mycroft’s. “We looked around the building where the two of you were found. Turns out he’d been staying in the area above. There were journals, but there was more than that. It’s been his hidden haunt for years. He’s had that building in the name Paul Snowe since the 1850s, made regular payments, and kept it well maintained and well modified, though not very well modernized.”

“What did you find?” Molly asked.

“He was obsessed with you, Sherlock,” Greg said. “The walls were literally covered with articles about you, from all over the world. And not even just print articles. Blog articles, too, including the ones from John. And he kept journals. We have hundreds of them to go through but…he was a nasty piece of work.”

Sherlock was quiet for a moment. “He said he got rid of Nichols. What did he do?”

“Not sure yet. Haven’t seen a mention of Arthur Bell Nichols in his ranting, but we’ve only gone back a few years so far. Maybe two,” he said. “And I doubt we’ll ever really know for sure. No point in exhuming the body, not after a hundred or so years.”

Sherlock nodded. He shut his eyes for a moment and buried his nose in Molly’s hair. She’d taken a shower in his washroom; Mary had thought to bring Molly her toiletries so there was now a bottle of cherry blossom scented shampoo and crème rinse and some jasmine scented body wash in his washroom, and he felt himself relaxing as he inhaled the pleasant scents from her having used them. He rather hoped she kept them there, to be quite honest, as he had hopes that this would become a more permanent arrangement. He wanted her in his life. He needed her, actually. He didn’t want to go back to the bleak, cold and lonely life he had had.

“I think we can take that as a sign that it’s time for us to leave,” Mycroft said quietly. Sherlock didn’t bother to open his eyes, listening instead as everyone filed out, listening as the sounds of the flat slowly grew quieter until he was aware that it was simply him and Molly.

“We’re alone now,” she said.

“Good,” he replied, opening his eyes as she pulled away to turn and look at him. He stared at her warm brown eyes, the smile on her face, the openness there. “If you stay tonight will you stay forever?”

“Isn’t that a bit rushed?” she asked, though she didn’t seem surprised, and she didn’t seem affronted, either.

“It is, but if all of this taught me anything it’s that I could easily lose the very important people in my life,” he said, reaching forward and tucking the lose strands of hair behind her ear.

“William Sherlock Scott Holmes, you are not going to lose me until we’re old and grey and we’re both on our deathbeds after we’ve had a long and fulfilling life together,” she said, leaning forward. “I promise. All right?”

“All right,” he said with a nod. She leaned forward some more and just before her lips brushed his he said quietly, “I love you, Molly Hooper.”

“I love you too,” she said before she kissed him, and as he let his fingers glide along her cheek so he could cup the back of her head to keep her close, he knew that everything would be all right. He had waited over two hundred years for this woman, and come hell or high water, he’d do everything he could to make her as happy as he possibly could.


End file.
